


Luminary

by PsychoShark



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Anime), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types
Genre: Minor Character Death, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:35:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28121736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PsychoShark/pseuds/PsychoShark
Summary: The world of Pokemon was as dangerous as it was unique. Ash Ketchum knew that better than most, but it didn't prevent him from setting out on his journey to be the very best. Will the desire to conquer the trainer world consume him or will he stay true to himself? Or will Ash go past the desire and become something great? A series of one-shots detailing Ash's most important anime battles, reinvented
Kudos: 5





	1. A Psychedelic Mess Pt 1

**Author's Note:**

> Co-written by Exodus, Some sub main and Nr 755. Shout-out to FearMeHorror and I. for beta reading this chapter
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon. Characters that appear in this work of fiction other than the OC's are owned by Nintendo

Emperors, beings from a bygone era that could control lands and any beings that walked upon them. 

Beings that were so powerful that their mere presence caused even the mightiest creature to bow down before them. There was never a need for a show of power, for their position at the top was cemented.

Time passed, and things slowly but surely changed. The modern era flourished, and Pokemon became a normalcy. Before long, they were used in every aspect of one’s life. Emperors were no longer of any use and thus, forgotten.

In the days of the yore, the Emperors were the ones who protected the humans from the monsters that attacked them, and were it not for them humans would have never developed as far as they have today. They had nothing to stake against the feral creatures of the prehistoric lands, and depended on the protection of the Emperors.

Despite all that, you have forgotten them… It is as if they were never there to begin with. A race dedicated to you, now exiled and forgotten.

They will however return… and you better be prepared, or there will be consequences dire beyond compare.

Do put on a good show... for my sake if nothing else.

I do hope it will be most _entertaining_ .  
  


* * *

Ash Ketchum, a 17-year-old trainer from the town of Pallet, excitedly walked down a sunlit pathway that cut directly through the heart of Viridian Forest. The path was called the Rookie Path by experienced trainers, and was the most well-protected area in the Viridian sector of Kanto. 

The last place he had travelled to that was 'wild' was Route 1. The Rookie Path turned out to be a much better route, featuring more ground to cover and a larger number of different kinds of Pokemon to catch. 

Recently, the league had even implemented new measures for safety including checkpoints and rations. This had been applied to the Viridian especially, with the promise of making the start of a journey slightly more shielded. 

Ash and his newly acquired starter, a pikachu, were on the Rookie Path in order to get to the Pewter Gym. Not only was this the shortest path, it was also the safest, and as such both partners were shrouded in a pleasant silence.

The young trainer had met his starter way back at the Academy of Pallet, when it was only a small little pichu. According to his mentor, the pokemon had been found during a rainy day by a couple of rangers. Ash never did figure out why the rangers had decided to give the mouse to the Academy, but they did. It might have had something to do with the fact that the Professor - Samuel Oak himself - was the founder and head of the Academy. It hadn’t been the easiest task for Ash to become friends with the small baby Pokemon. At first, the young pichu had been standoffish towards Ash, acting almost aggressively at times, but that slowly changed over time. It didn’t take long for Pichu to evolve into a pikachu, and they had been nigh inseparable ever since.

His reminiscing abruptly ended as a tail whacked him over his head. “Pika pika!”, the offender yelled, and Ash grinned sheepishly back at his partner. “Yeah, yeah I get it, I am just thinking of the forest you know, it looks so nice, beautiful even,” he told his friend, and the pikachu returned his grin. He pointed towards the unknown ahead and yelled “Pika!”, which told Ash he was just as excited.

They had been travelling for a couple of hours, during which Pikachu had spoken excitedly for the most part. What Pikachu wanted to say, he hadn’t been sure, but he felt good knowing that his partner was just as excited as he was. He knew that if they kept this pace up they would be out of the Viridian forest by the very next day, but there was still plenty to go, and the forest was known for slowing down travelers. He was thankful for the fact that there was a League sanctioned Pokemon guarding the path against any higher leveled pokemon, because otherwise, Ash and his partner surely would have had to make multiple trips to the Viridian City’s Pokemon Centre.

He still could not believe that he was going on a journey, it was almost as though it was a dream. If it weren't for the lush smell of plants or the fresh air overpowering his senses, he wouldn't have believed it. The feeling of the forest was immense, it was nothing like the small forested areas around Pallet Town. 

The ambiance of the forest wasn't the only sounds that fell upon his ears. He could still faintly hear sounds from the city he had just left behind, a city fondly called Viridian City, but the farther he walked into the forest the fainter the sounds became.

While Viridian had a Gym, the leader was rumored to be undefeatable. Even the leader’s weakest Pokemon could take down Elite trainers, and for this reason, Ash had opted to travel to Pewter instead. It was only a few days of travel past Viridian at most, and it had a reputation of having a beginner-friendly Gym leader, which was perfect for someone like Ash who was just starting out. Besides, Pewter boasted some of the strongest rock types in Kanto and he was hoping to capture one for his journey. Almost any rock type native to Pewter would make a good addition to his team.

He was brought out of his musings by a passing butterfree. While it wasn’t a very rare Pokemon, it was the first of its kind he had seen since he entered the forest. He watched the butterfly-looking Pokemon fly around the small grove of trees and continued staring at it until it disappeared into the distance. He figured that if he hadn’t been as hopeless with directions as he was, he could have followed it and _maybe_ even caught it. It was a bitter thought to consider. However, it only lasted for a moment as Ash was quickly back to being his chipper self once Pikachu hit him with his tail, not for the first time since they began walking.

By the time they had gotten farther into the path, the sounds of the city had disappeared completely, and both Ash and Pikachu were in awe of the forest they had found themselves in. It seemed so very _alive_ , and the feeling of the forest brought back warm memories. A memory of him visiting Oak’s ranch when he was a little kid quickly flashed before his eyes. It had only lasted for a moment, but he was filled with nostalgia as he was reminded of a tiny poliwag. At the time, the Professor had been taking care of it, but it was a curious individual, and it had followed him around as he went around fawning over every pokemon he saw there. He momentarily wondered what the poliwag was doing now that Oak had released it.

While the nostalgic memories had been pleasant, they had reminded him of something. Something bad and horrifying. He had forgotten to call his mother. She was going to skin him alive with words, or worse, she may just send her pidgeotto to hunt him down.

He tried distracting himself using the beautiful greenery that surrounded him, but he winced at the sound of a chirruping pidgey, that suspiciously sounded like his mother’s pidgeotto. The thought of his mother’s avian made him subconsciously rub a spot on his head, as he remembered all of the times he had been pecked by the damn thing. The arm movement was sudden, and Pikachu made his annoyance known by nudging his ear and grunting.

“Pika pi pika pika,” Pikachu said as it shook his head in frustration. While Pikachu partially understood his partner's fear of the pidgeotto, he also knew Ash needed to grow a spine. The fact that he was also afraid of the avian wasn’t important.

“I’m sor-'' something rustled in the grass behind them, and both Ash and Pikachu froze. Ash slowly turned around-

-and got a fistful of seeds fired straight at his face. He stumbled, clutching his face as it flared with pain, and fell forward due to the sudden lack of support.

“Seedot!” The cry came from a minuscule pokemon which resembled an acorn. An acorn with two tiny legs and eyes, but an acorn nonetheless. Something Ash did notice during his observation was that the pokemon’s body was puffing a bit, a clear sign to experienced trainers that it was preparing to fire another bout of seeds. Unfortunately for Ash, he was not an experienced trainer, and he was swiftly bombarded with more seeds. After a few more seeds to the face, Ash finally had enough and he got up when the seedot was busy charging its attack.

Silently Ash pointed his finger at the seedot. Ash had practiced this cue for Quick Attack earlier with Pikachu, and he hoped that Pikachu would notice the command. Fortunately for him, Pikachu did notice it and the electric mouse launched itself at the seedot, causing the small pokemon to fly into a nearby tree, the momentum and the crash causing a lot of damage to the smaller pokemon. The crash which ensued caused the perching pidgetto to fly off in alarm giving a little chirrup, and Ash was once again reminded of his mother. His sweet, _sweet_ mother. _Shudder_.

The seedot got back to its feet and started to glow a bright shade of red. Ash, in his adrenaline filled daze, was too lost in his mind to recognize the attack. 

Bide. It was an attack that allowed the user to hit back at their opponent with twice the amount of power it had been attacked with, but it was a tricky and fickle attack to execute, especially if the user had low damage enduring capacity.

While Ash stood there with a dazed look on his face, Pikachu was standing at a crossroad. The mouse could either send a miniscule electric attack to shock his trainer back to his senses and proceed to listen to what his trainer had to say to him, or he could take down the seedot on his own. A quick look at his trainer gave him all the information he needed to make a plan. As a new plan formed in Pikachu’s mind a sinister grin formed on the mouse’s face. This was going to be good.

Electricity slowly charged up in its cheek pouches and a slight crackling sound could be heard over the sounds of the forest. The sound increased in volume the more it was charged, until Pikachu finally released the attack at the seedot, a small charge running along the mouse's body and exiting out of his tail… directly at his trainer.

Both Ash and the seedot convulsed helplessly as the current passed through their body. For the young trainer, the sensation lasted for only a moment and quickly brought him back to reality, but for the seedot it lasted much longer.

The now focused teen looked around until his eyes landed on the seedot, and with a small flinch he realized he was in a battle. He was an idiot; just because a pidgeotto chirped didn't mean he was going to get pecked… better to not continue that thought process. 

Ash took stock of his surroundings and noticed his pikachu stare at the convulsing seedot… that poor thing, it must have been paralyzed. _Does paralysis cause you to become red though?_ he thought to himself. That was when he realized that it was not paralysis that caused pokemon to become red, it was a move, and the only move that a seedot could possibly know to turn red would be…bide.

_Although... isn't that pokemon unconscious?_ Ash thought to himself. Almost as if to prove that thought wrong, the acorn pokemon got up and then promptly ran into the bushes. He let out a small breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding. But then he came to a realisation. 

_Brock uses rock type pokemon, right? And seedots are a grass type pokemon. It is a bit of a weak one, but that is fine, I can train it up… hopefully. I’ll have an advantage over Brock if it all works out._

With that thought, Ash chased after the tiny seed, that could possibly be the key to his victory at the Pewter gym.

"Pikachu use Quick Attack and follow that seedot before it gets away."

"Pika!"

After a few minutes of running Ash finally caught up to the seedot and Pikachu, the latter confusedly staring at the small acorn pokemon enjoying an Oran Berry, seemingly cured of its paralysis.

"Pikachu, use Quick Attack to get close and follow it up with a Thundershock!" Before he finished his command, Pikachu was off, running at breakneck speeds towards the seedot. There was however one thing they both had forgotten; the seedot still had Bide set up. The thought occurred to both of them too late, and as Pikachu’s cheeks sparked from the electricity being released at his opponent, a small pulse of energy detonated from the seedot. Both Pokemon fell back, loosing consciousness at the same time.

He ran up to Pikachu, clutching the tiny mouse in his hand with slight worry. With his free hand, he quickly reached for an empty pokeball, and threw it at the seedot. The pokeball struck the seedot and sucked it in a red light. Just like the other two pokemon he had caught earlier, it kept on shaking for a while, indicating that Seedot was struggling. Ash held his breath, hoping that the pokemon was weak enough for the pokeball to contain it. When the ball stopped shaking, Ash let out a sigh of relief, his partner hadn't fainted in vain. 

Ash got to his knees and took off his bag, reaching into it for a Revive. He fed it to Pikachu, jerking his partner out of consciousness. 

"Are you alright?" Ash asked with a gentle smile.

"Pika," the small Pokemon nodded weakly, trying for a smile, but instead giving something that looked to be a cross between a grimace and a smile. 

“Not as easy as catching Spinarak and Hoothoot, huh?” Ash told his partner, as he touched the pokeballs on his waist, as if to check if they were still there.

“Pika pi,” his partner replied, thinking about the other pokemon they were travelling with. The entire friendship thing was a work in progress with them.

"Pika-cha~", Pikachu yawned, Ash looked at the pokemon for a bit. Maybe it was time for a rest. They _had_ been walking continuously for a while so a little rest won't be that bad. Especially after that Quick Attack spam. Come to think of it, he himself was a bit tired, having limited travelled experience.

"This looks like a nice spot to rest, nice shade and," Ash yawned, “it is hidden, a very important thing you know”, Ash whispered as he cradled the tiny mouse against his chest and eventually nodded off, the evening sun rays peeking through the foliage.

For the next few hours both Ash and Pikachu were asleep. Pikachu was getting a well deserved rest after his battle, and it only took so long before his trainer joined him. They reveled in their sleep, blissfully unaware of the world around them. This proved to be a fatal mistake.

Ash woke up with a start as he felt a sort of prickly feeling throughout his body. The source turned out to be the tiny, almost negligible, amounts of electricity his partner was pumping into him. Looking into the eyes of his partner, the fear was palpable.

Pikachu was waving his arms around frantically, pointing deeper into the forest, the same spot from where a buzzing sound seemed to be emanating from. A feeling of horror seized his heart and Ash jumped up in a standing position, all the while hoping against all hope it wasn’t _them_.

Ash slowly started to back away, realizing that maybe standing in the same spot might be a bad idea. His lessons from the various survival classes he took back at the academy kicked in. What was it that the old man used to say about a situation like this? It seemed Ash had forgotten, at least in his panicked state. 

_Oh Shit._

During the small window of time where he had spent thinking about what his old teacher had taught him, a creature had writhed out of the moonlit woods. It was a beedrill, and a dying one at that. 

_How? Who could have done such a thi- Oh no… is that a dent. What could have possibly caused a dent in that creature? This just seems like a bad situation and didn’t the old man say something about this situation… Oh man this was bad…_

He could faintly recall one of the Professors classes on the Viridian Forest. He had taught them that dying beedrills emitted a sort of pheromone that caused nearby beedrills to go into a rage. If a human or a pokemon or even an object were covered in this pheromone, any beedrill within a small range would attack them for thirty minutes or longer, the time depended on the strength of the beedrill and the potency of its venom.

With thoughts of a yellow striped body mutilated by three sharp stingers, Ash Ketchum ran away in the opposite direction, directly into the forest. He came to a startling realization; he was no longer on the moderately safe Rookie Path, and he sure as hell wasn’t running towards it. He had blindly chased the seedot without considering the consequences of leaving the path. _Getting off that path was a stupid idea_ , he chided himself. As he ran, he felt Pikachu get out of his arms and jump onto his shoulder. He had never seen the tiny creature express such a look of terror, and it only made Ash pick up his pace even more.

It took Ash a few moments to notice the buzzing sound, he had thought it was his ears ringing from all the running, but unfortunately, it was not.

_But we didn’t-_

His thoughts were interrupted by a voice in his head.

_“When a beedrill or any bug pokemon die, they emit a chemical all around the area. How it spreads is a question that has gone unanswered, but if you have it on you then your best chance is to jump into a river. If it is a beedrill that has emitted this pheromone on you, any nearby beedrills will get a significant boost in their strength, in fact, all of their stats double, this is an effect only seen in this species of pokemon and people have taken advan- Ash! Why are you sleeping in my class!”_

After Ash had managed to convince the professor that he wasn’t half-asleep, the professor had gone on to explain about beedrill venom, something that would leave you writhing in pain for hours, if not days. The only cure for it was the sweet honey produced by the beedrills themselves - a sort of remedy that could even cure common cold - but the issue was getting to a beedrill hive in the first place. Even tamed beedrill were notorious for guarding their hive. 

Ash suddenly stopped, glued to his spot by fear. There in front of him was a gigantic beedrill, and it was coming right at him, pointing its stinger at Ash’s chest. Its speed reminded Ash of those shows he had seen on the TV about missiles, it was just that fast.

The beedrill was stopped by a surprise attack by his partner. Pikachu quickly used Ash’s shoulders as a launchpad to throw itself at the beedrill. The pokemon used Quick Attack to speed up and intercepted the beedrill with a resounding thud. The beedrill crashed into the ground, and seizing the chance, Pikachu let loose a Thundershock which caused the beedrill to writhe in pain from its spot on the ground. Ash snapped out of his stupor and picked a pokeball out of his backpack, he was going to catch this beedri- More buzzing noises began closing in, and Ash ground his teeth as he put the pokeball back into his backpack, Pikachu jumping onto Ash’s shoulder as he turned tail and ran.

After running for a while, Ash - against all his survival instincts - turned back to see five beedrills pursuing him. He tried to focus back on his path, but the heavy running was starting to take its toll on him.

“PIKA-CHUUUUU!” Pikachu's signature battle cry came followed by another crackle of lightning. Pikachu was using his Thundershock to take down as many of the beedrill he could manage from his shoulder, but despite the tiny mouse’s best attempts to try to avoid hitting Ash, he was failing, and Ash grit his teeth with every shock that coursed through his body.

“PIKACHU! It's no use attacking. We’ll have to run”, Ash pleaded and Pikachu nodded grimly, determined to stay behind and protect Ash from the beedrill in case they caught up. After all, this human was the reason he was out of that stupid lab right now.  
  


* * *

It had been five long hours since Bruce had set out from his log cabin, five long hours since he had felt warmth or safe. He knew he had to continue his hunt, if he didn’t… the outcome was too unbearable to think about. During these five hours he got lost, found his way back and managed to almost lose his secret weapon. 

His monetary problems started the day he bought his secret weapon, a beast that was strong enough to defeat legendaries. Despite the problems that came with being broke, the pokemon had kept him happy. He had after that started working at the Celadon Bar, and things had gone well to the point he thought that his money issue was as good as solved… oh how naive he was.

The problem became apparent by his third week of work. He was clumsy, stupidly so since he managed to bring down entire shelves worth of alcohol in mere seconds. Truly a master of his art. He couldn’t ever remember being that clumsy, which was odd.

Soon he was fired and had neither a job nor money, what he did have though was this massive debt.

To combat his problems he battled rookie trainers from this town called Pallet and earned a lot of money from them, but that quickly stopped after the establishment of that accursed Academy, and he had to soon turn to battle centres. Since the nearest one was at Celadon he decided to go there.

At the battle centre his luck started to shine, he and his pokemon, Pinsir, had become very successful and earned a lot of money, although every time he brought out his secret weapon the opponent forfeited calling him insane. It must have been the beast’s hidden power. This good life lasted for almost five years.

The success had soon gotten to his head and he could not help but want more money. This continued until he began to lose. Everyone who saw his secret weapon refused to battle him, and even the referees forbade him from using it. All this led to his eventual fall from grace and he was soon left with nothing. 

Every last one of his possessions was soon sold for the sake of food for himself and his pinsir, and this continued until he had nothing left to sell, he had at that point decided to sell his secret weapon, but then at that point his memory went blank. It picked up right at the point where he decided he won’t sell the cocooned beast… which was odd… but it wasn’t anything to worry about, the pokemon will pay for itself at some point.

In the former years of his life as a poor person, due to his proud nature, he could not bring himself to beg for food but it only took mere weeks before he began to wander around the city doing just that. It was during one of his excursions that he learned about a man who was looking for an elusive scyther. The man was supposedly willing to pay handsomely for the pokemon, and it heavily sparked Burce’s interest. This was his lucky break.

After spending days searching for the person who put out the request he had finally found him. His name was Giovanni and he was the original owner of the scyther. The kind man even paid him in advance.

The first thing he did with the money was to buy Samurai equipment to keep himself safe from the scyther. The fact that he liked to dress as a Samurai was definitely not the main reason.

Knowing what he did about scyther behavior, he searched almost every forest in the vicinity but the pokemon eluded him completely.

All this brings us back to the present. Bruce was still searching for the elusive scyther, and his ever-faithful pinsir was right behind him as they both made their way to the nearby river. The riverbank was a place that every pokemon in the vicinity made their way to at some point, and he knew that the Scyther must be there. It was only a matter of time before he caught it.

After spending minutes trekking through and admiring the forest, the samurai was finally at the river. It was a beautiful day and the sunlight glittered along the fresh stream. The conditions were perfect. To ensure that the scyther did come today, he put a bait by the riverside. Bruce figured that the slight breeze would help spread it throughout the forest.

He sat down in a comfortable sitting position, waiting for the creature to come. While waiting he spaced out, thinking about his strategy. At first, he was going to defeat the scyther using his pinsir, and if she fainted, he would use his secret weapon.

The Legend-Killer was special, he knew it. He was waiting for it to evolve so that it could become something that went beyond a mere Legend Killer; it would be a Pantheon Destroyer. 

Its power would be so great that it would solo Lance’s entire team, and then some. Or at least that was what the seller told him.

The seller had also mentioned something about the beast forcing people to forfeit, which had worked so far, and then had gone on to tell him not to overuse it, or the hubris of victory would consume him completely. The mere thought of such a thing scared him.

He was jerked out of his thoughts by a steady humming noise that was emanating from behind him. He glanced sideways to see that Pinsir had frozen, looking at something behind them. He turned around slowly-

-only to see a scyther flying behind them. He nearly let out a shriek in excitement. Finally, after so long, the pokemon he had traveled all over Kanto to find was _right behind him_.

He had anticipated this moment for so long, upped the training of his pokemon to ridiculous levels, and had memorized every possible way for the scyther to attack so that they would have a counter to every possible situation.

“Pinsir, Seismic Toss”, the first command was issued from his mouth, almost on its own, the sudden noise causing the scyther to turn its head towards his direction. 

Taking advantage of the distraction, Pinsir moved at an incredible speed towards Scyther, she grabbed her fellow bug type before leaping onto a treetop, from where she jumped and slammed Scyther into the ground with an incredible force.

The scyther was stunned, but it didn’t allow that fact to deter it. It charged right at Pinsir, a streak of white blinding light being the only way to track its movement. It crashed directly into Pinsir, the claws on its arms ripping into the creature, creating an unsightly gash, but it was fine. Powdered Oran Berries were more than enough to heal a gash like that, and luckily he had some on him. 

While he was thinking of remedies to the wound, Scyther had used the momentum of the attack to propel backward, but Pinsir- in a brilliant showcase of her battle instincts - had grabbed Scyther and, through the use of Bind, had trapped it in a death grip. All that training had payed off.

No matter how much Scyther struggled, it couldn’t break free of Pinsir’s grip. Samurai smiled a bit, while the gash seemed serious they had succeeded. 

This was the movement he was waiting for, his hands found their way into his pouch, he took out an empty Netball, and -taking a deep breath- threw it with full force at the scyther. The Netball traced an arc as it flew towards Scyther-

-only for it to hit a beedrill instead. The netball shook once, then twice after that with a soft blue light it stopped moving, this indicated the struggle taking place within, and the subsequent capture.

Everyone standing there, including Scyther, was left frozen to their spot in surprise. Pinsirwas so shocked that she had let Scyther go, who seized its chance at escaping this insanity and promptly fled into the darkness of the night,

Bruce was shocked, he looked at the empty spot where the scyther had been moments before. His one chance at the scyther, his one chance at clearing his debt and making a name for himself, all that and more was lost. All because of a stupid beedrill. He had even given away his entire team to Giovanni as insurance.

“Pinsir, return,” he did not want his pokemon to see him venting his frustration at a bunch of trees, and it would allow his pinsir to rest.

Once he had taken his anger out on defenseless foliage, he calmed down significantly. He thought rationally and asked himself what a beedrill was doing so far out. No beedrill ever wandered out of the forest alone. 

This question was soon answered when someone came hurling through the bushes, faint buzzing noises following his thunderous arrival. An odd-looking boy who wore a league cap crashed right into Bruce, giving him no time to react or get out of the way. The boy and the pikachu he had seen on his shoulder fell onto him. He lost balance, and the trio promptly fell into the river.

All three of them immediately began to try and get out of the river. It was a battle that involved entangled limbs, a lot of drowning, and a wee bit of electrocution from the electric mouse. 

The moment they were out of the water all three of them began to wheeze and choke in an attempt to get the water they had ingested out of their system.

“Sorry”, the guy said, looking very apologetic. He saw him look around frantically for a second, before taking a deep breath and jumping into the river yet again. He saw the boy along with the pikachu swim quickly, as if terribly frightened. 

Bruce wondered what was that about until a buzzing sound began to assault his ears. He turned around, only to let out a shriek at the sight which greeted his eyes. That damned boy had brought an army of very pissed off looking beedrills.

He quickly dived back down into the river water, hoping that they would just fly past. He felt fear seize his heart, he had ever seen such a large swarm of bloody _beedrills_ of all things flying together like that. The swarm was so massive that they looked as though they were one creature. He stayed underwater, hoping that he wouldn’t be spotted.

_Bzzzzzt_. The sound was constant, almost never-ending, this served to show the sheer size of the swarm that was following that boy. Even after a few minutes of being underwater, the buzzing noise did not go away. Bruce was now stuck in between a rock and a hard place; he could either drown to death, or risk going back to the surface and breathing, which could lead to him being picked out as a target by the beedrill. 

A few more minutes passed and now Bruce only had one question, why were they following the boy in lar- wait. The boy must have Pheromone B on him. It was a pheromone emitted by dying beedrills, it could only be washed away by… water! No wonder the boy had jumped into the river. It wasn’t water itself that washed away the pheromone however, it was an odd plant that released some sort of weird anti-

Mid thought his air supply ran out and his mouth instinctively opened for air. Cold water filled his lungs and blood pounded behind his eyes. Every instinct in his body screamed at him to resurface, but he didn’t, the fear of the beedrills outweighed the fear of drowning.

Finally, he gave in to his instincts as the sensation of drowning increased and finally surfaced. As he did, the last few beedrills flew over him, but to his surprise, they ignored him, opting to just fly ahead with the rest of the swarm, and he knew this was not ordinary beedrill behavior. Then a thought struck him; what if the river water they were in was a pheromone amplifier? The crunch at his feet confirmed that thought… it was a river basculin. Their detritus amplified the effect of any and all pheromone that came into contact with them. Which basically meant that he was surrounded by hungry water types that just pooped out their earlier meal.

_When I get out of here I am going to kill that bloody kid._

“I choose you, go Metapod,” the wannabe samurai sent out his trusty shiny and tied a rope around it. Just as the basculin moved to bite the samurai, he flung the shiny onto the other side, directly onto the branch of a tree and said, “Metapod, use harden!”

The trainer yelled this a few more times while enduring the chomps of the basculins. At some point they had begun cutting through his skin. Thankfully he wasn’t a water-dwelling pokemon, otherwise… he shuddered.

Once the legen- metapod’s shell was strong enough, he slowly but painfully pulled himself to the surface. As he did this a small headache made itself known to him, a pain, a feeling of being stuck to something and pulled… A headache that made itself known to him everytime he used Metapod. 

Once he was safely on land he looked down at his legs, if they could even be called that, all he could see was shredded flesh that looked horrifying, and if it weren’t for his beloved metapod he didn’t even want to think about what would have happened.

He reached into his pouch and took out a healing salve, he knew he should have bought the full samurai set, but unfortunately, he needed it for the other supplies. He sighed as he rubbed the salve onto his feet, the chomps of the basculine that attempted to get to him serving as the background noise.

* * *

Ash gasped for breath every time his feet touched the floor. His lungs and heart were bursting, one taking in as much oxygen as it could and the other trying to break out of his chest. His limbs were in a bad shape due to the basculins that called the river their home. The pain was unbearable, but despite all that, he kept on running, a completely soaked Pikachu by his side. 

The farther he ran, the more things he began to see. Some constructed by his fatigued mind and others real, but by this point, Ash could not tell the difference between them. The gigantic figure lurking at the edge of his vision was starting to look as real as the trees around him. Was there even trees around him?

For some reason, the roots of the trees extended when he got close to them. Sometimes he tripped over them and was sent sprawling onto the ground, but the buzzing sound kept him running. Other times he tried to sidestep them, but even then the roots did not give up, they tried to follow him. 

At some point, he couldn’t tell the difference between when he was imagining the sounds of the beedrills buzzing and when it actually happened. The forest was starting to take its toll on the young trainer, but Ash knew he had no choice but to run. If he stopped, the toll of all the running would cause him to stop and he would be killed by the beedrills.

“Pika pikachu,” the mouse said before running into a particularly dark path. As much as he didn’t want to go there, he knew that his partner was up to something clever, and so Ash, despite the fear of death and the unknown in his heart, followed his best friend.

The path they were on was crooked, it forced them to take many turns at the oddest places, the entire path was built almost like a maze, there were paths that led to nowhere and even pokemon that tried to attack them. Thankfully Pikachu was strong enough to make quick work of them.

Turning another corner Ash ran faster, the buzzing had returned. 

Against everything his body told him Ash turned behind him to see whether or not the Beedrills were there, only to slam directly into a thorny bush, some thorns on the bush pushed into his body, past the skin, and small streams of blood appeared on his arms and legs. He extracted himself from the bush to try and run back the way he came, only to come face to face with _them._

Once again fear consumed him, but this time it took over both his mind and body and he lurched forward, the exhaustion finally setting in.

He was covered entirely in bloody gashes, to the point where even his mouth tasted coppery due to the amount of blood it contained. Ash spat out all that blood that had accumulated in his mouth, but it was no use, the cut was still generating blood, it seemed as though the taste would never go away. 

Ash opened his eyes, the beedrills surrounded him completely, but for some reason, some of them looked like they were differently colored, whispers echoed in his ears. The blood loss was starting to make him feel lightheaded.

He bit his tongue to focus, but due to the pain he was already in he found that it was a futile effort.

“Pi..ka..ch..u….. Bu...ddy…. Run,” Ash wheezed out and to his surprise, Pikachu ran away.

_Is this how I am fated to die? Surrounded by pokemon who want to kill me… I wish this wasn't the end..._ He looked around in hopes of finding some secret escape route, but unfortunately, he didn’t find any. _This is it. The end of a very short life and a journey, hopefully, Pikachu survives and finds a better trainer… Someone who can take care of him… Dammit! I should have listened to her… I should have listened to my mom… so… sorry..._ Ash finally resigned himself to his fate.

His life would be like all the others; meaningless and ordinary. He would die without making his mark on the world, forgotten with time.

Sure, he would be mourned by his mother and the old professor, but besides them, who would care? He would be just one person out of millions of others like him, with nothing distinguishing him from the rest. Just another cog in the mac-

“Pika pika,” his dark thoughts were interrupted by a frantic sounding Pikachu who appeared out of the darkness wielding a stick and some… berries?

Whenever one of the beedrills got close to Ash, the pokemon poked them back with the stick, all the while eating the berry.

Once it was done eating the berry the mouse dropped the stick and got into a stance, his cheeks were emitting small amounts of sparks, “Pi pi pika pikachu,” it chanted as it rubbed its cheeks, for what reason Ash did not know.

Then _it_ happened. Ash’s world erupted in the most brilliant shade of yellow and white he had ever seen. The beauty of the blinding light moved him to touch it, and suddenly pain flared through his nerves. He could not remove his hands from the light even if he tried. Panic shot through his body, and pain rocked his world.

As quickly as it began the entire spectacle was over, the sudden darkness that rushed into his eyes almost blinding him.

The pain he felt had been so great even the mere thought of it made him wince. Even now he felt every part of his body flare with pain. Ash tried to open his eyes to the best of his ability and was greeted by the sight of Pikachu who was carrying an armful of oran berries.

“Pika pi,” the small mouse smiled and fed him one of the oran berries he had, and Ash could immediately fel his nerves stitching themselves back together, he even felt he could breathe better like some sort of hidden block had been removed from his lungs.

Ash slowly tried to stand up, and while it felt painful, it was nothing compared to the pain he had been in before.

_Bzzt!_ The sounds were back, but didn’t the bright light take out all the beedrills? Maybe some had survived, Ash turned to look at the spot from where he had heard the buzzing noise, to see… a massacre. There was no other way to describe it. While there were still many beedrills left, their numbers had been halved, more than halved even seeing the amount lying dead on the floor.

The surviving beedrills looked almost shocked, he wanted to laugh at them but they did not look very pleased with the outcome. If anything they seemed downright pissed, but for some reason, they did not move.

The reason quickly became apparent when a buzzing sound emanated from behind him. Ash quickly swiveled around looking behind him to see a beedrill moving at an incredible speed towards him. It was fast, but Pikachu was faster, using a combination of Quick Attack and Agility to get in range with the beedrill. Once he was close enough, Pikachu let loose a combination of Thunderwave and Tackle throwing it back while causing paralysis, before charging up and releasing a Thundershock which caused the beedrill to drop down unconscious.

The other beedrills backed away at this display of power, but Ash knew it wouldn’t last. Soon they would all attack at once, and when that happened, Pikachu would surely be overpowered. There might not have been as many as before, but there were enough of them to overwhelm Pikachu and him. All of a sudden there was a crash. 

He looked around, trying to see what happened, where the crash had come from. It seemed even the beedrills were curious about the crash as even they were looking around. Seizing the chance Pikachu and Ash ran right through the gap between the beedrill formation, any that were in their way were promptly electrocuted.

It took a while but they managed to escape the beedrills, and that was when he saw the foliage next to them shake. Out of it emerged a figure clad in a gaudy Samurai Armor. The last time he had seen one of these was in one of his mother’s TV programmes.

The person, a boy who looked to be a bit older than him, was frantically gesturing towards him and Ash recognized him as the guy he had run into earlier.

Ash ran towards him, the bugs may have been farther back, but he knew it was only a matter of time before they found him again, particularly since they were once again covered in the beedrill pheromone. The boy got back into the foliage and covered it up while looking him in the eye. Clearly, he meant Ash should follow him.

Ash took off towards the direction he assumed the Samurai was in with Pikachu bringing up the rear, ready to battle any beedrill that entered in after them. As he ran, he could hear the crack of thunder and thudding sounds signaling that some of the beedrills had gotten through the gaps, and that Pikachu’s attacks were really effective in deterring them.

Soon the Samurai was in sight, he was waiting for them at the point where the paths diverged “This way”, the Samurai told him, as he ran in said direction, leaving Ash wondering, how in the name of Distortion did that Samurai run so fast with so much equipment? 

Ash had no time to wonder as the damned Samurai ran almost as though the devil himself were on his heels. If it weren’t for the low buzzing sounds behind them Ash would have asked him to slow down.

Ash turned around a corner and suddenly they were out of the bush path and in a clearing. He quickly spotted an eyesore of a log cabin. “Hurry! Get in!” Samurai shouted, and Ash did not argue. All three of them quickly got into the cabin, with the Samurai locking the door behind them. The cabin was shrouded in darkness, and the samurai walked into it. 

He returned with a small candle and he placed it on a table by a shelf. The room that was revealed by the room looked shabby almost lazily put together.

“The beedrills won’t be able to get in now, but just in case,” the Samurai threw a bottle that was sitting on his shelf at him, “before you ask, no that is not poison or one of those sleeping potions, it’s bottled beedrill honey.”

“Didn’t know they still sold these”, Ash said looking at the Samurai suspiciously as he sat down by the window.

“Relax,” the samurai said holding his hands out, “it’s from a personal stash, you can never know what happens in this forest, and so you can never be prepared enough for a trip here", well that was true, he had almost died due to not preparing. What was he even thinking getting off of the path? 

“The name’s Bruce”, the Samurai said his name with a sort of pride flair to it as he leaned against the wall in what was supposed to be a cool pose, but unfortunately he failed miserably.

“Ash Ketchum'', Ash introduced himself rather dully after he gulped down the bottle of honey. His mind kept flashing back to the beedrills, their beady eyes filled with loathing, an emotion directed towards him. A part of him still _liked_ the pokemon and that terrified him, would something like this happen again, would he almost die to another beedrill attack, would he-

"What are you thinking about?", Bruce cut through his dark thoughts.

"Oh nothing much…. Why do you have a hut in the Viridian forest anyway? Do you live here?”, Ash asked half-heartedly he just wanted all this over with. Maybe some sleep. That sounded good right about now.

“It’s not a hut!”, the Samurai yelled.

“Then?”

“It’s a shack.”

  
“Sure, whatever you way.”

"IT IS A SHACK YOU BRAT!"

"... if I'm a brat then you are a guy who argues with brats… think on that for a bit."

The more they talked the more Ash found pleasure in annoying the Samurai, the guy had amazing reactions, something that reminded him of himself. Anything was better than thinking about the beedrills at this point.  
  


“What about you? What are you doing in these parts of the Viridian forest?” Bruce asked Ash, once he had calmed down.

“I was on my way to the Pewter Gym, got sidetracked and lost”, Ash replied. 

“Think you can win the badge?”, Bruce taunted, “gym leaders are supposed to be pretty strong. You sure you can take one on?”

“If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be here”, Ash replied curtly. 

The samurai was unfazed, with a smirk he asked, “what do you say we battle to see if you can back your words up?” 

While he had grown up around Gary, who was a hundred times worse than this guy,Ash couldn’t help but feel insulted. Either way battling the samurai would be a good way to test where he stood. 

_‘Besides, the gym leader would be a lot harder to battle than this guy who can’t even build a house,’_ he thought to himself amusedly.

“Let's do it then”, Ash said. He got up and started to open the door but the samurai ran up to him and pulled him back, he even abandoned his cool pose and everything.  
  
“Idiot! First, wait for the beedrills to leave,” Bruce said looking panicky and Ash nodded sheepishly making his way back to the chair by the window sill, waiting for the danger to pass.

It had been three hours, three long and gruesome hours filled with boring and pointless chatter. Eventually, the beedrills had left, with no trace of them ever being there. Both Ash and Samurai headed out slowly, the moment they got outside they hissed covering their eyes, shielding it from the morning sun. It seems like they had managed to talk through the night. 

Bruce recovered faster than Ash and looked around to see if the area was safe, he was shortly joined by Ash who was a bit worried about beedrills appearing out of nowhere.

Once they had made sure that they were indeed safe they both stood at the opposing sides of the samurai’s homemade battlefield. Ash was excited but at the same time, he was nervous, the prospect of a battle washing away his earlier fears.

This was his first trainer battle ever since he had started his journey, this battle was bound to be more interesting than those in the wild. He straightened up, hoping he didn’t look as nervous as he felt. After all, if the other trainer knew that you were nervous, half the battle was lost. 

“Let's start this battle, 1v1?” Bruce asked. 

Ash thought for a moment, before shaking his head, “no, 2v2”, he replied. 

“Okay then, I’ll send out my pokemon first,” Bruce said before detaching a pokeball from his belt and throwing it, out of which appeared a Metapod.

Ash did a double-take upon seeing it. The metapod was _shiny_ , a rare variant of the pokemon which had a different color, it was orange.

All the same, he wondered why the guy sent a metapod out, all cocoon pokemon were notoriously weak, due to their fragile outer body. ‘ _Focus’,_ he told himself, shaking his head. Despite wanting to not battle the metapod Ash thought that maybe the samurai knew what he was doing, the guy did look experienced after all.

_‘I can’t use Hoothoot or Seedot. I just caught them and haven’t even let them out of their pokeballs. Since I want to save Pikachu for later, guess that leaves only-’_

He detached a pokeball from his belt and threw it into the air. A bright blue light came out of it and condensed before forming a small green bug, with a small stinger on its head. It clicked its jaws before coming to a stop, staring at its opponent. It was a spinarak, pre-evolution of one of the most dangerous bugs in the world, Ariados.

“Take the first move”, Bruce offered pompously, Ash sweatdropped, that poor metapod.

“Spinarak, Poison Sting”, Spinarak leaped into the air and landed, immediately stabbing the metapod with its stinger. Although the Metapod’s tough shell would prevent the stinger from penetrating too deep, the stinger still managed to poison the metapod. 

Bruce frowned at Metapod, being poisoned had put him in the spot, but thankfully he had taught the pokemon to harden without being given the command. “Metapod crush the bug with your Tackle”, the samurai said not realising that Metapod itself is a bug.

Ash did another double-take upon hearing that, “are you crazy? You’re seriously going to endanger your own pokemon for one measly battle?” He yelled.

It was a well-known fact that making metapod or any other cocoon pokemon use tackle could cause their cocoon to break open, causing them to evolve prematurely, which could be very harmful as they wouldn’t have developed properly at that point. 

Metapod, for example, would have deformed wings as a butterfree if they evolved prematurely. 

“Beware! This isn’t a regular metapod like you think it is. This is the Legend Killer, the metapod that will destroy the league as you know it when it evolves.”

Ash cringed for Bruce. Just how dumb was this guy? 

“What the- were you dropped on your head as a baby? What the hell are you smoking, you idiot?” Ash sputtered.

“Focus on the battle and prepared to be bedazzled”, Bruce said, gesturing at the pokemon.

Ash returned his gaze to the battle, seeing that while they were arguing, the metapod had moved barely 5 inches and wasn’t even close to Spinarak. He sighed, “Spinarak put that poor thing out of its misery. Infestation”, Spinarak let out a screeching noise. From around them, answers came in the form of screeches. 

Soon the whole area was surrounded by spinaraks of many shapes and sizes. They all crawled towards the battlefield, glaring at the metapod with murderous intent. Ash saw the samurai panicking, as various Spinarak crawled over Metapod and viciously attacked it.

Ash's spinarak plunged its stinger directly into Metapod’s cocoon causing it to squeal, while another bit another part of the cocoon, breaking a part of the cocoon. 

“Metapod!”, Bruce yelled, worried. He pulled out Metapod's pokeball, but instead of instantly withdrawing the pokemon he, oddly enough, walked upto the pokemon. The spinaraks at first made moves to attack but Ash’s spinarak made some clicking sounds causing them to stay there, observing the events that unfolded in front of them.

The samurai once he reached the metapod, scooped it into his arms, seemingly cradling it like a baby, “I forfeit Metapod '', he said looking grim. Ash smiled. Round one to him.

Metapod was retrieved after this strange spectacle causing the spinaraks to return to wherever they came from leaving Ash's spinarak alone on the field, waiting for its next opponent.

The samurai pulled out another pokeball while gritting his teeth and in a flash of blue light, a pinsir came out, battle-ready. 

Pinsirs were a rare species of pokemon and this specimen was _especially_ magnificent due to the sharpness of its horns and the thorns-like structures protruding out of it.

“Pinsir, use Swords Dance and follow it up with Strength”, the command came from Samurai, and the pinsir went through a series of moments before jumping towards the small bug. 

“Dodge and use Poison sting”, came Ash’s command. 

After the command Ash quickly turned to look at the pinsir, he did not want to miss even a moment of this battle. The pokemon was surrounded by a blue glow, signaling the rise in its attack power and it moved with speed so incredible that it was horrifying to even think that this was this pokemon’s natural speed. Spinarak sidestepped the attack and tried to plunge its stinger into Pinsir, but Pinsir immediately took to the air and came crashing down onto Spinarak with a full force Strength, crushing Spinarak and knocking it out in a single blow.

Ash stood there in absolute shock. The attack’s power was incredible, and it had been held longer than a minute, which was the charge limit for most moves. And even through all that, it had managed to outpace a spinarak - a creature smaller than itself - which was something that should have been faster than the much larger and bulkier Pinsir. 

The most awe inspiring factor of all this was the attack's strength. The attack was so strong it had knocked out Spinarak in a single blow. He shook his head in dismay as his mind thought up strategies at a quick pace. Maybe this won't be as easy as he had thought it to be.

Pinsir was fast, and it hit hard, especially with the Swords Dance boost. He only had one option. “Mind beating that pinsir, buddy?”, Ash asked his first friend. Pikachu jumped off his shoulder, landing on his feet, before involuntarily tensing up with a ferocious warcry of “Pika!”

“Pikachu keep your distance from Pinsir and use Charge”, Ash commanded smoothly and Pikachu stood there, looking warily at Pinsir. Small sparks jumped across his cheeks, indicating the build up of his electricity reserves.

“This is for Metapod! Pinsir use Bug Bite and throw that Pikachu onto the tree”, Samurai commanded vengefully.

“Dodge it”, Ash countered. Hearing this, Pikachu did a pirouette, and the intended attack missed him by almost an inch. Pikachu reoriented himself using a combination of Agility and Quick Attack, and using the momentum from those moves, Pikachu ran to the other end of the field, looking almost like a yellow blur.

“Thunderwave”, Ash’s next command came, and Pikachu released a wave of lightning that hit Pinsir. The sheer strength of the attack pushed the pokemon back and paralysed it.

“Pinsir, brave through it and use Swords Dance!”, the samurai yelled.

“Pikachu, Nuzzle!”

Using the boost provided by the two Agility and coupled with Quick Attack, Pikachu _launched_ himself at Pinsir. To the two spectators, he was nothing but a blur at this point. Pinsir tried to attack the mouse, but he dodged it and rubbed his cheeks against the pinsir, the electrical charge stored in his cheeks damaging the pinsir.

The samurai gritted his teeth and stared at Ash with contempt in his eyes.

“Strength”, Pinsir again leapt towards Pikachu, trying to use the same maneuver as before but then the paralysis effect kicked in, and Pinsir was down. Pikachu used Quick attack to jump in an arc above Pinsir and used it again to shift his momentum to launch himself right at the pokemon. The pinsir’s eyes widened.

“Pinsir, move out of the way,” but it was too late, the pokemon was already hit, but unfortunately for Ash, Pinsir did not faint.

“Pinsir, use Guillotine,” the samurai said darkly. Pinsir wobbled towards Pikachu, and Ash’s eyes widened. The action looked terrifying to him. “Pikachu, get out of there!!!!” he screamed, and Pikachu jumped, but unfortunately it had jumped above Pinsir. Ash had to watch as Pikachu jumped over Pinsir, his perception of time slowing down as he watched the pinsir jump and pluck Pikachu out of the air with its powerful pincers’ which were glowing an ominous white, an explosion followed causing Ash’s ears to ring and the battlefield to fill up with smoke and dust.

Ash anxiously waited for the smoke to clear to see what had happened. The moment the smoke cleared Ash's eyes darted around looking around for Pikachu. He spotted him lying unconscious in the middle of the field, causing Ash to run over to him. He took a revive out of his bag and fed it to Pikachu as he scooped the tiny creature up into his arms. The reaction was immediate, all the cuts on him healed, but Pikachu still did not get up, the mental toll was still too great.

“Well well well, you clearly aren’t as strong as you thought you were”, Samurai started smugly, “but that said it was a close one,” he admitted grudgingly. 

“Thanks a lot, but… I don’t need your pity Bruce”, Ash said as he handed over a few pokedollars to the samurai. The reason for this being, the set of reforms that the league had introduced to attract people towards the profession called pokemon training. One of them, as anyone can probably guess, was a monetary prize for winning a battle. 

“Uh Uh. Give me your pokemon as well,” the samurai said in a tone that sounded uncaring, but it had a slightly worried undertone to it, he tried to play it off by counting the money in his hands.

“Are you crazy? No!”, Ash said firmly, his expression looking a bit lost and worried.

“Hand them over or I’ll be forced to _persuade_ you into doing it”, the samurai - no… samurais were honorable, this person was not - Bruce said with a malicious smile adorning his face. 

Ash slowly started to back away. He was now aware of the fact he was dealing with someone crazy, someone who was willing to do anything just to get what he wanted. Why did Bruce save him though? None of this made any sense. Why was his journey going down like this?

“Hey come here. Where are you going?” Bruce said with the malicious smirk turning into a sadistic smile, he looked like he was enjoying himself. Ash turned around and quickly broke into a sprint. 

“Pinsir return,” the bug would be a liability due to its paralysis in this chase, “Beedrill come on out I need your help.”

Quickly filling in the pokemon on what was happening, the twisted samurai began chasing after the running trainer.

Ash Ketchum was tired of running. Ever since this journey had begun, he had _constantly_ needed to run. First from those thrice damned beedrills, and now from a maniac. This was going to be a pain tomorrow, that is if he lived to see tomorrow, the chances of which were getting slimmer by the moment.

He took a few turns, hoping that he could lose his pursuer, but he had no such luck. Bruce kept on coming after him, there was a beedrill with him too. Hopefully he wouldn’t have a fear of bug pokemon by the end of this _adventure._ Pikachu being in his arms didn’t help his speed at all, and he knew he needed a plan. Something, anything to escape from this situation… but every thought, every idea led him to a dead end… he had no hope, unless...

He suddenly took a sharp left turn and ran straight almost like an arrow. From his peripheral vision he could see that Bruce was surprised, he got a feeling of satisfaction from that. 

_Just a few hundred meters more,_ he thought to himself, spurring himself to run forward. He needed speed, more speed and Ash forced himself to run forward. Every joint in his body, every limb, _everything_ felt weak, but he forced himself to move forward.

Due to the speed he was running at he did not see the tree branch that was in front of him, and it caused him to trip and stumble through thorny bushes, until he finally landed in a small clearing with the air knocked out of him. The force at which he fell caused him to drop the pikachu in his arms, and the pokemon rolled a bit farther away from him.

Bruce by this point had caught up to and had unsheathed a sword he kept attached to his hip and pointed it at Ash’s throat, he had a crazed look in his eyes. “Give me your pokemon or else …”, he trailed off threateningly. Next to him, the beedrill buzzed menacingly as its red eyes glowed menacingly, but Ash wasn’t scared. He could feel a curious prod against his mind as _something_ searched for something. Once it had found it, the feeling receded and Ash was alone once more. He panicked, was his plan a failure? He hoped not.

The panic and fear of failure only lasted for a moment as all of a sudden a force, nay _energy,_ threw both Bruce and his beedrill into a tree. It looked quite painful, and Ash smiled to himself as he looked to his side. There, some 50 meters or so away, stood a pink dopey looking pokemon whose tail was covered by a large grey spikey shell-like creature that had two eyes near the base. It was a slowbro, and a league sanctioned one at that.

A league sanctioned pokemon was a pokemon trained by the league and placed on trainer routes to ensure the safety of trainers. Every trainer was taught the basic locations of these pokemon so that they may run to them in case of an emergency. 

They were very powerful, but apparently, Bruce hadn’t gotten that memo since he was now trying to get his beedrill to attack it.

“Beedrill, Twin Needle”, he screamed as Beedrill sharpened its spikes against each other as it went for the attack, but it was easily forced back. Slowbro turned to Ash and moved towards him with a dopey smile on his face, deflecting every attack that Beedrill sent his way, he could hear the rising panic in Bruce’s voice as the pokemon got closer to Ash.

The slowbro stopped its movement next to him, _“_ Slow,” it began and the world around him was consumed in yellow and pinkish-purple lights that seemed to be playing with each other. All of a sudden the purple colored light rushed at Ash and entered him “Bro!”. With that Ash, Pikachu and Slowbro were in front of the Viridian pokemon centre. 

However Ash was too lightheaded to notice any of that as he began to retch, his head was pounding. The pain, _the pain was unbearable._

All of sudden it disappeared, and Ash felt like something was snatched away from him, but at the same time something was given to him as well. 

_Odd, must have been a side effect of the teleportation- speaking of which_ Ash was now aware of the fact that the slowbro that dropped him here had gone away. He didn't even get to say a proper thank you to it. Ah well, he could say it the next time he saw the dopey beast.

Only one thought remained in his mind after this event. The lights he had seen helped him make up his mind. He needed to get stronger, stronger than that slowbro at some point. 

For now all he needed to do was defeat Bruce, for that he knew he would have to step up his training with his pokemon. 

After all that is done he _will_ find Bruce, and this time he _will_ win and he _will_ show Bruce the pain of taking away someone’s pokemon... even if only for a brief moment. But for now, he and his pokemon needed rest.

As Ash walked into the pokemon centre a thought snapped into his mind, this rage it was his… wasn't it?


	2. A Psychedelic Mess:Pt 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The world of Pokemon was as dangerous as it was unique. Ash Ketchum knew that better than most, but it didn't prevent him from setting out on his journey to be the very best. Will the desire to conquer the trainer world consume him or will he stay true to himself? Or will Ash go past the desire and become something great? A series of one-shots detailing Ash's most important anime battles, reinvented

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Co-written by Exodus, Some sub main and Nr 755. Shout-out to FearMeHorror and I. for beta reading this chapter
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon. Characters that appear in this work of fiction other than the OC's are owned by Nintendo

Three days had passed since the slowbro had defeated him. Three days that were spent training his pokemon and thinking about his mistakes and most importantly planning ahead.

Everything about that day pissed Bruce off. He did not even know if he could put his anger into words, and if he could, it would be a one long bleep. Every time he thought of the brat and his pokemon he felt anger consume him.

Why did the brat not listen to him? It's not like he was asking for something unreasonable. Only strong trainers should be given pokemon, especially if the trainer had a legend-killer. Now though, now the newbie and his pokemon were _gone,_ all because of a _fucking slowbro_. Why did it have to be a bloody slowbro of all things? Those weak dopey looking fuckers.

He thought back to his encounter. That slowbro had completely destroyed his team, not to mention what that newbie trainer, _Ash,_ had done to Metapod _._ His poor precious legend-killer.

The way he walked reflected the vengeance he had on his mind. It seemed as though his thoughts had seeped through and into the very way he held himself, but he couldn't help himself. That boy and the slowbro had severely pissed him off.

The voices whispered and promised him sweet sweet vengeance, all he needed to do was kill the boy in front of his pokemon, and they would obey him. Then again, he knew that either the boy would run away or come to him, but Bruce had a feeling that he would come. It was only a matter of time. 

The boy… the boy will die, he will be killed when the time comes, maybe his pinsir can rip him apart… or or he can use his beedrill to poke holes in his stomach and watch him bleed to death. Ah, so many ideas. 

Before his vengeance however, he had something else to do. Something important, the very reason he came into this bloody forest. 

A grin stretched across his face as he spotted his target standing next to a large tree, it’s back turned towards Bruce, completely unaware of the incoming attack. It had taken him a few days to track this creature down, but it was _worth it._

Slowly without making a sound Bruce plucked out a pokeball from its spot at his waist and emerged from his hiding spot. Slowly caressing the pokeball Bruce threw it onto the ground and in a flash of condensing blue light, Pinsir appeared. She was confused at first, but when she saw Scyther a glint of recognition passed through her eyes and she was soon clattering her horns together aggressively, challenging the other pokemon. 

The scyther hearing the sound turned around and spotted them. A glint of recognition sparked in its eyes as it got into an aggressive stance, ready to fight.

"Pinsir, catch!" Bruce yelled and tossed a Cheri Berry at her. His pinsir caught it and immediately ate it, not even bothering to chew it.

“Now, use Strength” with that the battle started, and Pinsir dashed forward with her claw-like hands glowing, heading directly towards the scyther. Scyther sidestepped the attack before slashing its scythes at Pinsir, the attack was barely dodged.

"Pinsir, use Bugbite," the command was issued quickly in a counter and Scyther was unprepared for Pinsir to appear right in front of him, _biting_ cleanly through Scyther’s shoulder, causing the slightly smaller bug type to scream in pain.

Once it had recovered slightly from the pain, it tried to slash at Pinsir. It caught her off-guard and gave her a shallow gash in the abdomen, but it didn’t seem like it was particularly painful.

“Seismic Toss, now!”, Samurai ordered, gritting his teeth in worry, He did not want to fail another time.

Pinsir grabbed the Scyther, jumping into the air with its strong legs and, once they had attained a high altitude, she let herself fall. She slammed the scyther directly into the ground with an immense force. 

Despite all that, Scyther merely winced and got up with a roar, and responded to all the pain with a brutal Air Cutter. It threw Pinsir back and gave it another gash on its abdominal region, causing both the samurai and his pokemon to wince in pain. That looked like it hurt, alot, and Bruce hoped it wouldn't impede his pokemon.

The situation was starting to look bleak, just like _that time_. The battle with Slowbro passed through his mind, but he did not allow it to continue.

Last time, he had to sacrifice Pinsir for his victory, but now things were different. As he put his hand to his belt an image flashed across his mind, an image of his Pinsir writhing in pain as he applied powdered oran berry on her wounds… but it was all fine. As long as Metapod got what it needed everything was fine.

The beedrills had almost attacked him on his chase, and he had needed someone to bring up the rear. Pinsir was the only one who came to mind, but she was hurt, and the other pokemon he had that could battle- a beedrill - would never fight against the hive for a trainer who had recently caught it.

But since then the link, or as the league called it, the _bond_ had properly formed - especially since Samurai had sped up the process by using his _special technique_ \- it was now one of his pokemon, his and Metapod’s _property,_ just like Pinsir.

_How dare that creature try to defeat what is mine and Metapod’s? I will show it pain. Pain beyond imagination,_ he thought as a malicious grin spread across his lips.

He detached another pokeball from his belt, throwing it in a flash of light. Beedrill appeared, awaiting his command.

“Poison Sting,” he hissed and the beedrill, _his_ beedrill, _moved._ In less than a second it covered the distance between itself and the brawling Bugs, stabbing Scyther with its stinger.

Scyther took the sting and replied with a Fury Cutter, which was dodged by Beedrill. While Scyther was focused on the Beedrill, Pinsir took the opportunity and landed a powerful Strength attack.

Scyther was pushed back, and Beedrill pursued. Scyther launched a Razor Wind at Beedrill, forcing it back. Then Scyther doubled over, indicating that the Poison Sting had successfully poisoned Scyther.

Samurai grimly smiled. It seemed the situation was salvageable after all. But the only problem was that Scyther was now attacking from long range, not allowing either Beedrill or Pinsir near it.

He knew that Pinsir didn’t have any long range moves and he only knew two moves that Beedrill had, but he quickly found out that he did not need to worry.

The constant barrage of attacks from the scyther was seen as an attack on its pride since it couldn't even hit the damned bug once and it had prepared something already.

The field went silent all of a sudden as Scyther stopped as if sensing something, a beat passed by and Beedrill let out a screech, a horrible sound which pierced Bruce’s ears, causing him to flinch. ‘ _Isn’t this the same attack that the brat’s spinarak used?’_ he thought to himself before his eyes widened and one single thought went through his mind. _Oh no._ Seeing as Pinsir had escaped into her pokeball she had thought the same too, and he couldn’t even blame her, he would have done the same too if he were in her situation.

When the buzzing got closer, he knew without even looking that they were surrounded by a swarm of beedrill. Horrible memories passed through his mind as the samurai shrieked as he dived down to the ground, covering his head.

Fear held his body causing him to be stuck to his position on the ground, covering as dread twisted in his gut. All thoughts in his mind and every thought process told him that this was the end; he would die at the hands of a vengeful mob of beedrill, his training wasn't as effective as he thought it was.

It took him a few moments, but he noticed that despite being an open target the beedrills had done nothing to him. This caused him to look up, and that was when he saw that the swarm wasn't focused on him. Rather, they were here after they heard a cry from their kin who had alerted them of a scyther that challenged the swarm.

By the time he had looked up the scyther was frozen to its spot as the swarm struck it, Bruce too was shocked, this was working out for him better than he thought it would. All of the beedrills attacked the bipedal bug at once, the scyther attempted to swat them away but ultimately failed, but then _it_ happened.

At first the change was barely noticeable. The wind around the scyther was at first a pleasant breeze, but as time went on it increased in strength and gained a funnel shape that increased in visibility, but the beedrills seemingly couldn’t feel it as they kept on attacking it. That quickly changed when the wind gained momentum and the beedrills were sent packing. Some crashed into trees, others fainted the moment the wind touched them, the scene looked as though it were chaos personified.

Seeing the carnage surrounding it the scyther _smirked_ and let out a challenging roar. 

The roar reverberated in the samurai's skull and he let out a roar of his own, it was time to use Metapod… it might have almost lost to that brat, but it was still the strongest pokemon he had on him. The best pokemon.

“Metapod reveal your true powers and crush our foe.”

Silently, a majestic orange colored cocoon landed on the battlefield, unlike before the beast looked a bit more purple, that must mean that the creature had powered up. It looked like they stood a chance.

“Metapod, use tackle,” Metapod rushed forward at a confused looking Scyther and hit it and fell to the ground weakly.

“Not so brave now are ya stupid bug?”  
  
The Scyther looking absolutely bewildered lifted its scythes, there was a purple twinge as it brought it down onto the metapod, and Metapod simply fainted.

“Nooooooo, ” Bruce yelled. Metapod won’t die… it can’t die… it will _never_ die.

Then he felt something in the air _change._ Something was happening, energy swiveled around him, energy so thick he could feel it, even taste it almost. The multitude of feelings was something indescribable, he couldn’t detail it even if he had to. All this came from the metapod in front of him.

Two images were superimposed before his eyes. Two probabilities, two states, two different creatures, one looked like the orange metapod he had and the other looked like something he had never seen before, an anomaly. 

The more he looked at the change of states the more he felt his mind twist and turn as he tried to comprehend it, until eventually the two simultaneous events broke away, leaving only one present, one definite event. His metapod had evolved into something else, he was going to dub it… Indico, a pokemon that he _needed_ to survive.

The new bug looking pokemon had hollow eyes that had a red glow, and due to its brown and purple coloration, it looked like someone had carved a bug out of purplish dead wood. It had wings that looked like scales awkwardly clumped together, they floated in pairs of 3 behind the insect looking beast, flapping in a way that gave the illusion that it was the wings that caused the indico to fly and not something else. Two deformed horn-like feelers protruded from its head, they looked like a carved tree stump, but they moved around in this odd fashion that was both believable and unbelievable, they _seemed_ to move around while staying in the same spot. 

Bruce wasn’t sure about what was going on, but he knew it was favorable to him, but that feeling of certainty lasted until the creature glowed as its eyes landed on the confused scyther standing above it, that was when it _screamed_ . It was so horrible that even the samurai felt the need to run away, because he knew that _this_ was a legend killer. Whereas before this thought filled him with happiness, now it filled him with dread. He had finally got his money’s worth he originally thought, but now he wasn't so sure.

In the few seconds that the bug catcher had spent thinking to himself, Indico had crushed the scyther to a pulp.

“Stop,” he said shortly, and the pokemon surprisingly obeyed him. It stood at ready beside him, ready to kill the Scyther at even the slightest hint of hostility. 

While this was happening Scyther staggered, wounded and close to unconsciousness. Bruce sensing an opportunity, threw a net ball, which hit the Scyther on top of its head. It winced in pain as it turned into a red light. The ball barely moved before it flashed blue, the pokemon was caught.

Indico, once its target disappeared, looked at Bruce with a judging eye. In that moment he felt _fear_ , a sense that he could die if the creature in front of him decided it. Instead of killing him or even attacking him, it merely nodded its head and went back into its pokeball.

That was scary.

At least he got two pokemon out of this. He took out two pokeballs, one an ultra ball and the other a netball. They contained the pokemon he would use to destroy the brat and that slowbro, pokemon that were strong, stronger than anything he had on his party so far. He looked around at the beedrills laying on the ground, some dead and some unconscious. That scyther was strong, why should he give it to Giovanni?

He tried to forget that thought, money was more important. It was too late; the idea had already taken root, he couldn’t forget it because of that. He thought of the brat and the slowbro, anger slowly but surely beginning to cloud his judgment. He would think of Scyther’s fate later, now it was time for revenge.

Bruce found himself hiding behind a few bushes, after a well deserved nap, the foliage providing him cover as he waited for the Slowbro to appear. There was a slowbro lure by the riverside, put there by him. He had just broken in the scyther. Initially didn’t listen to him, that was until Pinsir and Beedrill beat the lesson into it for a… how many times did they beat him again? Whatever, not like he cared. Nothing mattered as long as Indico was pleased with him.

He had healed up his entire team using berries the moment he got up, and now he was waiting for that goddamned slowbro to appear. While he was waiting, he remembered something, an event that happened while he was feeding his pokemon berries.

Scyther had tried to steal some berries from Indico, but the pokemon did not take kindly to it so it sent out what looked to be some sort of signal. It had turned Scyther sort of purplish and the pokemon ran towards the nearest bush that contained Cherri berry, all the while Indico stared after it as it ate the berries both it and Scyther were given. 

It looked like it was still too early however, judging by the position of the sun, maybe he should get some sleep in before its evening.

* * *

Bruce found himself hiding behind a few bushes, after a well deserved nap, the foliage providing him cover as he waited for the Slowbro to appear. There was a slowbro lure by the riverside, put there by him. He had just broken in the scyther. Initially didn’t listen to him, that was until Pinsir and Beedrill beat the lesson into it for a… how many times did they beat him again? Whatever, not like he cared. Nothing mattered as long as Indico was pleased with him.

He had healed up his entire team using berries the moment he got up, and now he was waiting for that goddamned slowbro to appear. While he was waiting, he remembered something, an event that happened while he was feeding his pokemon berries.

Scyther had tried to steal some berries from Indico, but the pokemon did not take kindly to it so it sent out what looked to be some sort of signal. It had turned Scyther sort of purplish and the pokemon ran towards the nearest bush that contained Cherri berry, all the while Indico stared after it as it ate the berries both it and Scyther were given. 

That entire thing freaked him out, in fact the pokemon itself freaked him out. In retrospect, he now wished he had never bought i- The pokemon was awesome, he should have bought it sooner, what was he even thinking? He was just going craz-

His thoughts were interrupted by a pair of footsteps, it was rapid, but slow enough to be almost classified as stealthy, hell if Bruce wasn’t where he was he wouldn’t have even heard it.

He strained his ears to try and identify what type of pokemon it was, the footsteps were moving too fast to be of a Slowbro’s, but that freak of nature was too fast so one could never be too sure. That was when he saw who was passing by, and he grinned. He didn’t get the slowbro but at least he got his other target. Oh revenge was sweet, utterly delectable. So what if he didn’t get the slowbro? At least he got the source of all his troubles.

He leapt out of his hiding spot and landed with barely a thud, and in a swift movement, he released his go to bug, Pinsir. The bug pokemon came out in a battle ready stance, standing with its horns pointed toward the other trainer, the sunlight reflecting off of it making it look even more intimidating.

“Stop right there, punk”, Bruce said commandingly, “did you think you would get away after what you did to _me_ boy?”

The kid was standing there, his league cap over his face, his pikachu on his shoulder just as Bruce had imagined.

“Ah Bruce,” the kid started, his voice utterly calm, “just the person I was looking for. How have you been, _friend?_ ”

“What the fuck is wrong with you punk? Hand over your pokemon or I’ll order Pinsir to attack. You think you’ve seen my worst you punk? With one command I’ll unleash Pinsir on you like a storm. She’ll rip you apart from limb to limb and scatter them in such a way that no one'll even know you died here."

"Sure" the kid said, standing still even when Pinsir rushed at him with an attack ready. It was stopped when the pikachu launched itself at Pinsir, countering Strength with Quick Attack. It caused a stalemate, something that hadn't happened before, but Bruce attributed it to rookie’s luck.

“Pinsir, use Bind”, Pinsir launched herself at the pikachu, aiming to trap it in a death grip, but the tiny mouse was too fast. 

“Thundershock”, came the command from the kid. What was his name again? Ass Ketchup? No, Ash Ketchum.

The rat released a bolt of electricity, which struck Pinsir, forcing her back. Samurai cursed, knowing that Pinsir’s lack of long range moves would be detrimental in this battle.

“Pinsir, Strength. Get close and squash that yellow rat.” Bruce yelled, Pinsir tried to move towards Pikachu but unfortunately, the kid wasn’t as dumb as he thought.

“Pikachu, Thundershock. Keep away from that pinsir.” the kid told his Pikachu.

The pikachu heeded his trainer’s words, attacking Pinsir with repeated Thundershocks instead of the charged Quick Attacks. Whenever Pinsir got too close, it would escape with a Quick Attack.

“Damn it” Bruce muttered to himself, he was in quite the spot. Pinsir couldn’t take more attacks, and it was no closer to hitting that small _shitty little rat._

Finally, Pikachu slipped up. It came too close to Pinsir and it paid for it. 

Pinsir landed a powerful Strength attack which sent it flying, and with a crunching sound crashed roughly to the ground. The attack was powerful and Samurai grinned. Finally something had gone his way. Now time to take advantage of this.

“Pinsir, Guillotine”, he grinned maliciously. Pinsir moved towards the downed Pikachu, her pincers a shiny white color, intending to finish the pest which had bothered her for so long.

“Pikachu, take the attack,” Bruce was confused at that command, didn’t the newbie know that Guillotine was a strong move? In the past, _executions_ were conducted using this move.

“Are you okay in the head Ass?”, Bruce taunted, but the boy ignored him. Asshole, no wonder his parents named him that.

His pinsir picked the pikachu up, but before it could use its pincers to cut the pokemon into half, the damned rat electrocuted Pinsir. She writhed in pain, but before she fainted she closed her horns on the rat, but the trainer barely reacted to the action, Bruce felt a chill go down his spine, what happened to this boy? The boy he had known earlier would have whined at this point.

“Return Pikachu,” Ash said coldly as he took another pokeball from his waist, his eyes were still covered by the cap, this was strange, very strange. This wasn't the trainer Bruce had battled before, it was a beast of logic, someone who thought before he acted, and the feeling of dread was starting to show itself.

Why did the brat not freak? Was something wrong with him? Did he go psycho? If that was indeed the case then…he was right, of course, his pokemon weren't safe with him. In fact, he would be doing them a favour, all the more reason to fight for them.

“Scyther, time to shine”, he said upon releasing it. The green bug stood in front of him, in a battle ready position. Ash stared at the Scyther, scrutinising it, unintentionally unsettling both Bruce and Scyther.

Ash wordlessly plucked a pokeball off his belt and dropped it a small chittering could be heard as a tiny bug appeared chittering. 

“Poison Sting”, the first command was issued from Ash’s mouth, and the spinarak moved, attacking Scyther. Scyther dodged the attack easily and swiped back out of reflex,but Spinarak ducked under due its own reflexes.

“Wing Attack."

“String Shot." 

Two orders came simultaneously, one from a slightly unnerved Bruce and the other a calm Ash. 

Scyther readied itself for Wing Attack, but this was intercepted by Spinarak who launched webs at Scyther, trapping it. 

With Scyther incapacitated, Spinarak was given plenty of time to use a Poison Sting. The bug ran directly at Scyther and pushed it's stinger into Scyther. Thankfully due to Scyther's tough exoskeleton, not much damage was done, but Scyther was poisoned. Granted, the effect was rather weak, but the fact remained that it was poisoned.

Scyther staggered slightly as it got up, but proceeded to use its scythes to cut through the webs in its body before charging right at the spinarak. The attack caused the small bug to fall to the ground, but it wasn't without a cost. Scyther stumbled, falling to its knees due to the poison taking effect.

Bruce was again in a difficult position. Scyther was about to faint, no doubt about that, but Spinarak looked somewhat healthy, and this was unacceptable.

All of a sudden Ass's eyes widened. Looking at Scyther, he saw that the pokemon had begun to charge an attack. It charged at Spinarak and slashed its scythes at the pokemon, the scythes digging into the small bug, each attack leaving an after image of a bird. This lasted until the pokemon fainted, but Scyther looked hurt badly at this point; it looked like it barely had energy to be standing.

"Spinarak, return," Ass said, looking a bit puzzled, but he quickly reoriented himself and sent out another pokemon, a hoothoot. 

“Scyther, do your best,” that did the trick as the pokemon quickly straightened up, it was battle ready.

Both pokemon did not wait for any sort of command as they charged at each other little more than blurs to observers.

“Scyther, crush that bird with a slash.”

“Hoothoot, use hypnosis and peck.”

The moment both pokemon met midair, something fascinating happened. Hoothoot pecked the creature where Spinarak had dug a hole earlier causing pain to Scyther. It tried to swat the bird away with Slash, but it's scythes were covered with strange rock like protrusions. Luckily for Hoothoot it managed to barely avoid the scythes by getting out of their range quickly.

Once the hoothoot got out of Scyther’s range, it began to sway to some unseen music. All of a sudden Scyther, who was watching this spectacle, began to get drowsy. Before it fell down, the creature jumped and ran straight at the hoothoot. Its eyes looked desperate, it seemed his _encouragement_ earlier had worked.

Hoothoot looked shocked, which only served to make the samurai feel more gleeful. Once Scyther got in range, it slashed at the tiny bird. There were sparks surrounding the scythes of Scyther, and Bruce once again realized that this specimen was indeed special.

Despite the amazing spectacle, Scyther fainted. Hoothoot had somehow managed to stay up, despite taking the full brunt of that amazing slash.

“... How?”, Bruce was stunned. How had this happened? Why did that pokemon not faint? Only one emotion took over his mind at this point, and that was anger. Rage at the hoothoot and its trainer. Because of it, he never noticed the slight swaying of the weakened Hoothoot’s legs.

"Go Beedrill, show this brat his place."

"Hoothoot, can you fight?" The damned bird simply nodded as it looked towards the beedrill with its round red eyes, and the trainer simply allowed it. This never happened before, people usually withdrew their pokemon after they got hit with a strong attack. Whatever, this trainer would come to regret this.

The brat was doing something stupid, but it was fine. In the end Bruce _will_ win, Indico will ensure that. The creature was a Pantheon destroyer, a beast of legends - no - it was a _legend_ , a pokemon beyond comprehension. Bruce laughed maniacally as he imagined the horror on the boy's face. Once he snapped out of his delusions he focused back on the battle. The very first thing he looked at was the boy. He expected the boy to look confused at his outburst, but instead the boy _smirked_ , and then had the gall to nod towards the battle, the beedrill - _His beedrill_ \- was being attacked, but it did _nothing_ . _Why was this happening?_

That was when it struck him. Beedrills don't, or rather, can't attack without a command.

_Crap! Damn that brat!_

“Beedrill! Use Fury Attack on the hoothoot,” hearing this Beedrill immediately put some distance between the hoothoot and itself, before rushing at the tiny bird and repeatedly stabbing the creature with it’s stingers. The hoothoot was covered with tiny pinpricks by the end of the attack. When Beedrill tried to draw away once again, the hoothoot used the opportunity to use Peck repeatedly on Beedrill.

By the time Beedrill had gotten away, it looked ready to drop. The bird had done a number on the creature, but Hoothoot looked to be in a similar condition to Beedrill. The bird was ready to drop as well, it was only a matter of time now.

“Poison Sting”, Beedrill rushed towards Hoothoot, aiming its stinger at it, aiming to poison it before it went down, but it was not to be.

“Confusion”, Hoothoots eyes glew a faint purple color. Beedrill glowed the same color, stopping in its tracks. Hoothoot exerted its psychic influence and smashed Beedrill roughly to the ground.

Despites its best attempts to get up, it couldn’t. It tried to improvise by using Rage. It was a move that caused pokemon to be so angry that they went past their physical and mental capabilities, becoming almost unrestrained as they attacked their foe even at the cost of their own life.

Beedrill went straight for the hoothoot, sometimes crawling and sometimes flying until it finally got close enough to the pokemon to attack it. What followed was a brutal beatdown, blood flew as both pokemon fought like packs of rattata over food, and this would have continued if Ash hadn’t made the decision to withdraw Hoothoot. Beedrill hadn’t noticed, and it continued attacking the ground until Bruce, not wanting to see the pathetic sight any longer, withdrew it as well.

They were each down to one pokemon, and Bruce felt fear coil in his heart. Maybe he should forfeit, maybe he sh- preposterous, a good battle never hurt anybody. His thoughts were going all over the place. What was up with him today?

It was time. Time to use his very own Legendary, “Kill the boy, Indico,” he said, and in a flash of blue light his special weapon came out. Now that he looked at it closely the creature bore great resemblance to one of those Seraph things, except it looked like a bug. _Strange_.

His thoughts were interrupted by Ass; “You fool! What did that creature ever do to you? Answer me!”, if he had thought Ash was angry before, he had clearly been wrong. This was something beyond anger, this was unadulterated rage, or as those hippies that called themselves Aura Practitioners named it, Killing Intent.

Gulping and ignoring it, Bruce decided to call out an attack. That’s when he felt it, a single drop of rain fell on him, and then another and another until it began pouring. He looked towards the opposing trainer, and that was precisely the moment when the cap covering Ash’s face went up. The sound of thunder reverberated throughout the forest and a flash of lightning struck the ground illuminating Ash’s face, and what he saw shocked him.

The boy’s eyes….. They weren’t brown like earlier…. They were.. They were…. Purple. Something was wrong, very wrong. The rain only made this entire thing even more ominous, and at this point all Bruce wanted to do was escape.

“Seedot, lend me your strength,” the odd phrase and the glint in Ash’s eyes triggered something as a green light flashed and formed a sentient walnut, who looked almost happy to be in the rain.

“Indico, use psychic”

“Leech seed.”

Seedot’s eyes turned pink as Indico injected a small amount of psychic energy into the pokemon before tossing it into the ground. The seedot seemed unfazed as he got up just as quickly as it had fallen, before launching a small tiny seed into the ground.

Thunder crackled in the distance, as Seedot tried to remain at a distance from a teleporting Indico to no avail. It looked like Indico would win, as expected.

“Indico, use confusion!”

“Bide,” Ash countered. _Crap_ , Bruce thought. The move was going to cause a lot of damage.

Indico looked into Seedot’s eyes, and in a matter of seconds a signal was passed into the mind of the seed-like pokemon. The pokemon was confused, and this could prove to be highly beneficial as it could potentially attack itself. 

However, the damn seed turned out to be as tenacious as its trainer as it started to glow a bright red color, before unleashing a huge blast of energy which struck Indico. The attack wasn’t supposed to work like that! Wasn’t there any sort of waiting period?! This wasn’t supposed to happen…

Indico flew back screaming, a sound so horrible that Bruce involuntarily shuddered, feeling the pain his pokemon was in. Once the screeching had stopped he looked towards his precious pokemon. He was shivering at this point from the rain, and yet the other boy, Ash, stood there like a statue, and then he smirked.

On the field the Leech Seed the seedot had planted had grown and it had attached itself to Indico, and just like that Indico was weakened more and more for every passing second.

“Indico!!!” Bruce was now really worried. 

However something else was going on. There were cracks on Indico’s shell, and the pokemon was shuddering again and again. Bruce didn’t notice, caring more about the battle than the health of his own pokemon. He ignored the small headache forming in his head, it told him to retrieve Indico and run, but he was too invested in the battle to even care about that.

“Indico, use Confusion”

“Seedot, use Bide”

Before anything happened however, something went terribly wrong. A screech erupted from Indico who broke free of the Leech Seed, before it was surrounded by a bright white glow, which blinded everyone near it.

Soon Indico was surrounded by a huge ball of energy, which rapidly expanded to the size of a pumpkin. The energy within it could be felt from far away as the energy ball kept increasing in size with no sign of stopping.

“Indico stop this right now”, Samurai said as he backed away in worry. But then, the expansion stopped, and for a moment, everything was frozen in time. Bruce let out a worried breath he didn’t know he had been holding. Whatever had happened to Indico seemed to have stopped. But then, the energy ball started to destabilize.

“Seedot, use protect”, Ash, foreseeing an explosion, commanded. Samurai ran as far away as he could in fright before Indico _exploded._

The explosion was felt far far away, all the way till Viridian and Pewter. It completely destroyed the area they were. Seedot’s Protect tried to weather the explosion, but it began to crack. Soon it shattered, throwing both it and Ash back.

The aftermath of the explosion was incredible. Every tree in a 100 metre radius had been uprooted. Where Indico stood, there was a large crater. Seedot’s Protect had saved Ash and it from the worst of the explosion, but they still sported some burn marks. 

Bruce on the other hand, was nearly unconscious. He had been badly burnt, and he had hit his head on the ground. 

He tried to get up so he could search for Indico. But then he saw a shriveled shape inside the crater, upon seeing which he broke.

“Indico….Indico NOOO!!” he screamed in despair. His money was gone, his chance at a good life-gone, everything was gone. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.

He tried to get up, move towards the pokemon. Instead, his own body failed him as he fell over. Tears fell from his eyes as he looked up at the raining sky. Everything had gone so terribly wrong, this was not right.

“Give me back Indico,” his screams began softly, but the pain from the explosion had set in and Bruce felt pain flare across his body.

“You did this,” a pair of footsteps walked up to him and before he knew it without seeing who it was. The voice he hated the most confirmed something he knew.

He felt the pain increasing as the blood leaked from the wound on his head, but he ignored it. He needed answers, “How did I-” blood spewed from his mouth, “do it?”

“The pokemon evolved too soon, you abused it, you did not let it evolve at its own time,” Ash said before sitting down on the ground next to Bruce and for the first time in a while Bruce cried his heart out. Every injustice done against him, everything he had done to his pokemon, every event passed through his mind, and surprisingly he felt an emotion, something akin to regret… He was a terrible person, and it was only at the end he realised it.

He never thought about how his actions affected other people. It was always about him, and the worst part was, he couldn't do anything about it. 

“I… Please don’t te-ll any...o...one especi…..ly not my pare-” those were the last words Bruce the samurai uttered as he followed Indico, his pokemon. He may not have completed his sentence, but the other boy knew what he was about to say.

There was silence for a little longer as one last thunder rumbled across the field as the rain let up. Despite everything that had happened, Ash couldn’t help but smile sadly.

It was a beautiful afternoon…

* * *

Ash had waited until the samurai had passed on before he got up. He did not want to do this action in front of the samurai. No one should do such a thing to another trainer, but this was for something important. 

In a second his hand found the belt in which the samurai kept his pokemon and he pulled out a pokeball from the samurai’s lifeless body. 

Moving away from the body, Ash found a rock to hit the pokeball against and he did just that. The sound of metal on rock rang out repeatedly until the pokeball finally caved in creating a small hole out of which a fizzling sound was released.

Most people did not break pokeballs because they release large amounts of energy along with the pokemon, and so such a thing could cause a lot of damage. This is exactly what happened here as the small whistling sound increased until it turned into the sound of a crackling thunder.

In a moment white energy exploded in front of Ash, almost _pushing_ him into a tree, but he was saved just in time by a slowbro who appeared behind him, applying force in the opposite direction using its telekinetic powers.

“Thanks for the save Slowbro,” Ash muttered before taking a pokeball out of his backpack and capturing the scyther for himself. The creature could be useful for his journey. 

Staring at the pokeball for a while Ash tried to remember when he last caught a pokemon. It seemed like it had been such a long time ago. Shrugging, he placed the pokeball in his pocket. 

Once that was done, Ash took a look around himself, everything looked destroyed yet picturesque. One day when he got a castle for himself maybe he could make a picture of this event. His purple eye flashed a bright pink before reverting.

Eventually he moved back over to the samurai - Bruce his name was if his memory was to be believed - after admiring the wasteland-like scenery around him. Once he got close to his body he stared at it, this person was someone who abused his own pokemon, an evil vile person… and yet in that moment Ash felt a bit of sympathy for the boy. After all, even villains needed someone to shed a tear on their grave. Besides, a great king - an emperor - would shed a tear for every one of his subjects.

When Ash looked over to the corpse of what was meant to be a butterfree he saw nothing. It had disappeared, but before he could think more on it a splitting headache took over his head as something else came to the forefront of his mind.

**_I can see you Ash Ketchum,_ **

“Oh no, wh-what happened?” Ash questioned looking horrified as he stared at the samurai’s dead body, he could clearly feel something was wrong.

One moment he was angry, standing in front of the Viridian Pokemon Centre wanting to take the samurai’s pokemon and the next in front of his dead body. What was going on?

His mind seemed to be trying to forcefully calm him down, but this only caused a nightmarish strain to be placed on his body. He wanted to retch, but his mind was going against the action, he wasn’t feeling disgust, it said.

Unbeknownst to Ash there was something else going on, an event that had once happened in the past was once again happening in the present. The cogs were once again in motion, spinning wildly. The only thing that remained a mystery would be the outcome.

Ash fought against the feeling of alien calmness as he fell to his knees. Tears leaked from his brown eyes as he stared at the body. That was when he realised that his constant companion, Pikachu, was not with him. Where was Pikachu? 

Thankfully, for that at least his mind provided an answer... the pokemon was in its pokeball.

“Pikachu!” Thankfully his pokemon did not electrocute him. For some reason he was drenched wet in rain water, but he couldn’t remember it raining.

Everything was going _wrong._ What happened to him?

The next few hours were a blur of confusion. His mind was forcing him to feel calm, but he couldn’t help the feeling of confusion. There was an odd feeling he was being watched, and the image of Bruce’s dead body just won’t leave his damned mind!

The pain in his head increased the more he thought about it and Ash ran, to where he did not know… he ran in random directions until he fell unconscious, his mind was stretched to its limit.

The next time he woke up Ash was in a hospital bed. He squinted and could barely make out the form of someone that was next to him. After a while, his eyes opened to see a police officer. Judging by the tag on her lapel, her name was Josephine S. She stared at him with a look of sympathy.

“Hello Mr.Ketchum, I understand that you must be a bit confused at the moment. If you have any questions, please ask me, and I will do my best to answer them.” The lady said all this with a kind smile on her pale face.

“Where am I?”, the voice that came out of his mouth surprised him, it sounded gravelly and unused.

“You are in Pewter City,” she answered.

“Are my pokemon okay?” Ash asked worriedly when he did not see any pokeballs on him.

“They are being treated at the local pokemon centre, they seemed to have taken quite the beating. What were you doing so deep in the Viridian Forest if I may ask?”

“I was trying to capture a seedot and I followed after it and then after that I was attacked by a swarm of beedrills… then I was,” something in his mind snapped as a calmness entered into his voice, “attacked by these two strange people who claimed to be from Team Rocket, they tried to steal my pokemon and I battled them when a bug catcher saved me.”

The rest of the time was spent with the lady questioning him about his story, trying to find holes in it, but when she didn’t find any she got up, a look of concentration on her face. “I will file a report against these criminals. Rest assured Mr.Ketchum, these people will be caught for killing your friend.”

“Thanks a lot ma’am.”

“Your welcome dear. Get some rest now. Once you get up, you can call your guardian and collect your pokemon. Do be careful on your journey,” and with that, the lady left.

Ash breathed a sigh of relief. He planned to do just that, but this journey was one he couldn’t forget, especially not the dead body he had seen. 

A body he could have saved if only he had been aware of what he was doing. Everything was just so damn confusing… hopefully a talk with his mother would clear everything up. With that thought in mind, Ash Ketchum closed his eyes and let himself rest.

* * *

For Delia Ketchum, her house seemed empty. Silent. This was because her son, Ash, had left on a journey with his pokemon, Pikachu.

Ash and Pikachu usually got up to all sorts of shenanigans in the house and Pidgeotto, not wanting them to disturb Delia had begun to discipline them. What that entailed, she did not know, but Ash did seem a bit fearful of the avian. 

Ever since they had left the house, it seemed as though it wasn’t a house anymore, it seemed so very silent and desolate. 

The other issue was that Ash, despite having gone for almost two weeks, failed to call her. Everyday she eagerly waited for him to call, only for her to be left disappointed. Even though she had told him to call regularly, he hadn’t called her even a single time since he had set off. 

The next time he called or came home - whichever came first - she was really gonna let him know how she felt about all this.

She was snapped out of her musings by her pidgeotto landing onto her shoulder. She patted his crest, before feeding the bird some seeds that she had kept in her pocket. 

The pokemon chirped contendly while Delia smiled as she moved towards the couch to sit, it felt like the bird was getting heavier and heavier with each day. She sat down on the sofa, stroking the bird’s feather as it squawked happily. She had never understood why both Ash and Pikachu were so scared of Pidgeotto, he was completely harmless. 

Her thoughts were interrupted again, this time it was a song that interrupted it, a song from a TV series Ash liked to watch called _Gast Busters._ She frowned, _Who could be calling at this time of the night?,_ she thought to herself, and the possibility that it might be Ash struck her. If that was the case, then she wanted to know why he hadn’t called her for this long.

She flipped open her Poketch and saw that it wasn’t Ash but instead it was Professor Oak, _That’s strange. What would he want at this time?_ She accepted the call, only to see the tired and grim face of Professor Oak.

“ **Delia, check the news quickly”,** Professor Oak said hurriedly, mildly panicked. He looked very worried, like something really bad had happened.

“What happened Professor?”, she questioned him, searching his face for answers. 

**“It’s about your son,”** the old Professor said, causing Delia to immediately run over to the television, her heart lurching. Upon turning the TV on, she quickly switched the channel from the Evening Talk Show to the Goldenrod News Channel.

**_“-Trainer was killed in the explosion and five others were injured. Initially the police suspected that it was chain pineco explosion, but after further investigation, Officer Jenny, the youngest officer under the banner of Pewter Police Department, discovered two trainers at the heart of the incident, one as mentioned earlier was killed and the other trainer one, Mr. Ash Ketchum, was interrogated by Officer Josephine about what had happened…,”_ ** the more Delia heard the more she horrified she became, her baby boy had almost died. _Died._

**_“The young trainer, initially thought to be the preparator, brought a few surprising facts to light. Team Rocket, previously thought to be apprehended, has escaped prison, in fact, they were the cause of the Viridian Forest Explosion. At first, I was confused, dear viewer just like you are right now, but unfortunately, that piece of information is true. This was confirmed by the Viridian Department where the members Jessie and James were held. They caused major pandemonium, even going as far as to steal and brainwash a Meowth from the Gym Leader Giovanni. They truly are the worst. Over to you Tom.”_ **

**_“Why thank you John, we are glad to inform you that the Alolan Vulpix Giveaway is done and over with and the winners are-_ ** **”**

Delia sighed in relief. Her baby boy was alive. She sat down on the couch, grateful for that fact.

**“** **_Ahem,_ ** **Delia I’m still here”,** Professor Oak reminded her, causing her to jump a bit. She had forgotten that bit due to everything that had just transpired.

“ _Squawk,_ ” her pidgeotto, who had been sleeping, was disturbed by the sudden movement. He decided that the human wasn’t going to stay still anymore thus, in his opinion, wisely moved to the perch to continue sleeping.

“Oh sorry Professor,” Delia apologized before picking the poketch from the sofa. When had she kept the thing there?

**“Have you had any contact with Ash since he started his journey?”** Professor Oak asked.   
  
“No. He hasn’t called even once since he set out”, Delia said while shaking her head.

**“Sounds like him. He hasn’t called me either”,** Professor Oak said sounding amused and grim at the same time. Delia nodded.

**“I will look into-”** he began, but was cut off by Delia, “I got this professor, don’t worry.”

At first, he looked like he wanted to argue but then as if he had thought of something just nodded silently, **“I will call you later, bye Delia,”** he said before he cut the poketch.

Delia sat on the couch, thinking. She had to find a way to contact Ash since he himself would always forget to call. If only Ash hadn’t broken his poketch, then they wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place. 

All of a sudden an idea struck her, and she got up, grabbed her notepad, and tore out a page. Hopefully, this would work.

She scribbled on it with a pencil and got a small piece of thread. She scribbled something on the paper and tied it with the thread around Pidgeotto’s leg, who looked at her bleary-eyed before she whispered to it. “Find Ash. He’s in Pewter. Find him and give him this note”, she told him, to which he nodded. His eyes glinted with some sort of emotion before he charged into the distance, shaking himself midflight to get the sleepiness off of him.

Delia watched him fly wistfully, wishing that she could’ve gone with her pokemon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this isn't an update, just splitting the old chapter into two parts. Sorry guys.


	3. A Rocky Filler: Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon. Characters that appear in this work of fiction other than the OC's are owned by Nintendo

The fire crackled from its place at the center of the room, projecting long shadows onto the surrounding area. The light cast by the flames danced across the walls and shelves, their every movement revealed the spines of the books that lined the magnificent shelves. The fire itself was pulsating, almost as though it were setting a rhythm for the light to follow. The sight was almost mesmerizing to watch, colors of orange and red merging and splitting to form new colors, sometimes even attempting to escape out of its restraints. It truly was an interesting sight.

Intriguingly the shadows the flames cast as a result of their frolicking had a muted feel, they twisted and writhed following the movement of the fire like a beast its master’s, and just like a beast it was forgotten when one gazed upon the flames. The sight reminded the young man gazing upon the scenery of Kings he had read, about those that gave up and followed other Kings when they were defeated. Just like poochyenas.

“Sir,” a muffled voice brought him out of his musings, it was accompanied by sounds of floorboards creaking and shuffling feet, “sir are ya there?”

With a heavy sigh, the young man replied, “yes, I am,” that elicited an excited gasp from the speaker, who got into the room the young man was in and looked around, mystified, “didn’t take ya for the booksy kind of person, sir. You are a strange fellow, sir.”

Both of them stood there for a while, the silence filled by the crackling fire. This silence lasted until the newcomer, an old man, decided to speak up, “what are ya doin here sir? The caretaker does no’ like people here.”

“Is this not a library?”

“That it is, sir.”

“Then aren’t the books in here supposed to be read by the visitors who come here?”

“You are right sir.”

“Then I don’t see the problem since that is why I am here.”

The old man looked down at his feet and fidgeted a bit and finally said, “well ya see we townsfolk don’t know how to read books so we tried to use em as kindle, the caretaker didn’t take like that very much.”, to this the young man responded with little more than “I see.”

A few more moments passed and the young man finally moved from his position near the entrance to one of the shelves, as he did this he took a small notebook and a pen out of his breast pocket, “you go on ahead Mr.Jake, lest your better half yell at you for being out this late at night.”

Jake laughed awkwardly as he rubbed his head, “ya sure, sir? The missus would yell at me if I left ya alone too.”

“No no it is fine, you go on ahead. I need to read some of these books anyway. They are a part of the reason I came here after all. You can tell that to her.”

“Thank ya very much, sir,” the old man said as he wobbled his way out of the room through the large entrance.

The young man looked at the old man as he left straining his ears to see if anyone was coming before walking along the shelves, brushing his fingers past each of the books as he read their titles. There were many a book, some for children, others for adults, each one of them fascinating in its own way, but unfortunately, they weren’t what the young man was looking for.

This lasted for a long time until he let out a sigh of disbelief, “it can’t be… the book isn’t here, it seems the caretaker has hidden it-”

“Or she has it at her home,” a voice startled the young man, causing him to drop his notebook and pen. It was the old caretaker, how she had gotten in was a mystery, but she looked livid, extremely so.

“What are you doing here boy? Better speak fast or I will sic my Seviper on you, he loves tender human skin and yours will do just fine.”

A gulping sound resounded throughout the room and the young man tried to answer but it came out in a stuttering mess, “I.. uh.. Well wa-wanted to r-read the boo-ok,” he paused taking a deep breath upon seeing the warning look on the old caretaker’s face before continuing, “about the Four Great Emperors.”

“Interesting. Why do you want to read it, boy?” the old lady asked in a slightly less grumpy tone than before.

“The Emperors had a powerful artifact that I want,” the young man licked his lips as he thought of his words carefully before he continued, “I need it to help some people I know.”

“Boy, you are better off leaving that accursed book alone.”, the old lady tried to walk away, but upon seeing the crestfallen look on the young man’s face she continued, “how about this? I will give you another book and you forget this ever happened.”

“What book?”, but instead of answering the old lady walked past him and deeper into the library, she had a somewhat weary look on her wrinkly face. 

Sounds of rummaging were heard and she returned a bit later with a book clutched to her chest, “here boy, make sure you use the information well… or else...”, she trailed off threateningly leaving the young man to do nothing but nod rapidly.

Once the young lady moved away a bit the young man let out a sigh and looked down at the book he held with a reverent look, ‘The Legend of Tree of Life’, the bold text on it read, although the book itself looked a bit tattered. It was a wonder that it survived the test of time.

“Ahem,” the caretaker cleared her throat to gain his attention, “I expect you to read this here and to return it to me in perfect condition sonny. Which reminds me, what is your name anyway.”

The young man smiled and said, “My name is Giovanni, nice to meet you, Mrs.Caretaker.”  


* * *

A thick morning dew clung to the forest below, glistening brightly as the rays of the rising sun passed through it. The rays brought forth a new day, the forest has awakened from its night of slumber. This was the sight Pidgeotto was greeted to as he flew over the wide forest known to many as the Viridian Forest. To Pidgeotto however, this was once home.

As he flew over the wide expanse he tried to spot something to eat, he  _ had  _ been flying continuously over the land for almost an entire day. He needed-no he deserved- a break and some snacks, and so it was with these thoughts that Pidgeotto soared through the heavens in search of prey.

His eyes searched, watched, and waited for even the most minute movements in the underbrush. He soared above the ground, amid the clouds. The sultry air being beaten against his colossal brown feathers, as he surveyed his surroundings, it was then he noticed something purple jumping amidst the green foliage and in a moment he was after it, swooping down into the forest below.    
  
Just before he landed onto the ground however he lifted his wings and flung his sharp talons outwards before flying back into the sky. There was no use in checking his talons for he knew the creature had been caught. He could feel the warmth of its body and the beating of its heart.

Now where to eat this catch of his? Maybe on that tree over there-

That was when he noticed it, a gigantic crater in Forest. The crater looked very very brown, but more importantly, that was the spot where his flock used to hang around. He frantically flew towards the area, he knew his flock might have moved away but he needed to know what might have caused the crater.

Upon reaching the spot, Pidgeotto flapped as looked around, using his keen eyes to look around, in a second he saw that there was a tiny spot that was deeper than the rest of the crater, it looked to be the size of a butterfree but smaller, and looked as though the creature had slammed into the spot.

He was brought out of his musings by the rattata struggling to get out of its clutches. Clearly, it thought that it would have better chances of survival if it were dropped from high up in the sky. Maybe he could help the creature test that theory.

Pidgeotto let go of the rattata and swooped down after it. The wind felt good against his feathers and the rattata looked to be having a terrible time, if it weren’t for the large crater where its home used to be Pidgeotto would have said life was good.

_ Whoosh! _

Just before they landed Pidgeotto captured the rattata and smashed it against the ground, it was time for lunch. It wouldn’t do to search while on an empty stomach after all.

It was much later after eating the rattata did Pidgeotto realize that maybe he should have kept the little rat around, if for nothing else other than entertainment. Not like he could do anything about it now anyway.

The avian let out a squawk and ruffled its feather before taking off into the sky, it needed to look around to see what might have caused this, the message for the brat can wait, unless… it couldn’t be true, but the brat might know about this crater, after all, he had gone through here.

It made one more circle around the area before taking off towards Pewter City, that was when it noticed a trainer, a purple-haired man who looked to be searching for something. Disregarding him Pidgeotto flapped his wings and shot faster, not noticing that the man was staring at him with a look of interest in his eyes.

It was sometime later when Pidgeotto stopped to rest near a waterhole that it happened, the smell of fresh rattata meat emanated from the spot behind him. It would definitely make for a good meal… in fact, maybe he could even keep this rattata aside as he had planned earlier. Entertainment was sparse these days.

With these thoughts in his mind, Pidgeotto let his nose lead him to the rattata.

Midflight Pidgeot felt his world erupt into pain, a feeling of something running across his body was projected onto his mind, and he chirped in pain. This was electricity, that was all Pidgeotto knew about his situation, all thanks to that pikachu. The question Pidgeotto had however was,  _ why was he being electrocuted? _

The feeling lasted for mere minutes, but to Pidgeotto it lasted for an eternity. Despite the electricity being removed from his body, he was still twitching, his entire body was still experiencing phantasmic spasms. This reminded him of that day long ago… the reason Delia Ketchum caught him. That godforsaken pikachu.

He had been a fledgling Pidgey who had been exploring outside his forest in hopes of discovering new things. That was when a small boy with a pikachu appeared, he obnoxiously yelled, “Pikachu, use Thundershock.”, and similar to this a feeling of electrocution erupted throughout his body, he thought he was going to die in fact.

Maybe he would have, but his body changed, he went through the  _ shift _ and became a pidgeotto, just like what was happening right now. Except this time he would be stronger. He would become a pidgeot.

He tried to get up, he refused to evolve while he was lying down, but his body refused to move. Every muscle on his body protested, but Pidgeotto ignored them, his eyes flashed as energy engulfed him, all the information in his brain, everything he knew surrounded him, something deep within him shifted.

He fell over as he felt his world split into two, the past and the present, his weak self or a stronger future, and he very obviously chose the path to strength. Just as he did so an electric bolt was thrown his way, but the  _ shift  _ interrupted it, stole the energy, and put it into him, and so he squawked, loudly and in pain.

This was more than pain, this was something so painful it needed to be called something else, he felt two energies in his body war against each other. One was the foreign electrical energy and the other the flying energy. He was being ripped apart.

Eventually, after a long time, the pain faded a bit, but he still felt like his body was being ripped into pieces. The pieces that were formed were eventually put back together and he felt something being added to it.

The pain and everything that shackled him shattered as he finally formed and turned into Pidgeot and he spread his wings, squawking loudly, meanwhile in front of him the purple-haired human looked at him in shock.

Pidgeot was definitely going to have fun with this, of that he was sure.

The wind slowly swirled around him as he flapped his mighty wings, the trainer tried to make his pokemon, a yellow creature that had black markings on it, to attack Pidgeot. Electricity ran through his body again, but oddly enough he felt no pain. There was nothing in fact as he felt his body take it and store it in him.

Pidgeot continued to fly, but he was interrupted by a small ball hitting him, it tried to suck him in, but just as it began it stopped, falling harmlessly to the ground.

The human looked at him in anger and a twinge of fear, he yelled something, but Pidgeot quickly whipped up the air around him in an attempt to use Gust, but for some reason, his instincts told him to stop. Maybe some other approach was necessary.

He felt his body search for the remnants of the electric move that the other pokemon had used earlier, he felt like he could use it if he could manage to find it. It took some time, but thankfully the trainer did nothing, instead, the trainer simply opted to observe him. 

Energy swiveled around him, the latent energy in Pidgeot converged and diverged trying to form and branch out into something else until it found a stable form, a conductor for electricity. Information flooded into his mind and he let out the move, Thundershock.

He winced as he felt the phantom feeling of pain as he released the attack. When he looked to see what damage his attack had done his eyes widened, the attack had done no damage, just like what had happened to him earlier. Did that mean he was now an electric type pokemon, oddly enough he still felt like the basic energy compositions in his body hadn’t changed. Instead, he could only use the electricity to enhance his moves.

Maybe he had stolen this from the other pokemon. For some reason, that thought brought joy to Pidgeot.

He was brought out his musings by a roar that erupted from the other pokemon as it rushed at Pidgeot, he felt anger erupt in him as he stared at the charging pokemon. He won’t go down without a fight. 

Similar to how he had stood up against that Pikachu years ago, Pidgeot wordlessly flew right at the other pokemon.

Midflight used Agility in tandem with Quick Attack and Wing Attack as he charged right at the other pokemon, he was practically a blur as he appeared in front of the red-eyed pokemon. With a sudden spread of his wings, Pidgeot stopped himself, but the air he had moved with him moved forward at high speeds. This was a new move. A new way of attacking for Pidgeot.

The Shift was truly a wonderful thing, not only did it enhance a pokemon’s natural abilities, it also gave it a form that could handle those abilities. Some pokemon hated the Shift ( _ cough  _ Pikachu _ cough _ ) because of how different the form was, they almost never got used to their form and would die, and from what he had gathered that was what had happened to Pikachu when he evolved into his current form. The pikachu would have died were it in the wild, and that may or may not have been the reason Pidgeot forgave the little rat. 

Pidgeot shook itself out of its reverie and stared on as the heatwave moved and relished the look on the trainer. The utter confusion and slight fear in his eyes as it widened, brought a sense of joy in him that could not be captured in words. 

The pokemon meanwhile looked a bit horrified as he felt the heat from the air that was moving towards him, and hastily tried to get away, but fortunately for Pidgeot, it was too late for that course of action.

He did not stay around for the after-effects of whatever happened and instead wisely decided to flee. Maybe he could capture actual rattatas next time. 

Once he gained significant altitude he turned back to see a brown bird, slightly smaller than him, but it was flying with the other trainer on top of it. If he had a mouth he would have smirked, this was way too perfect.

Aided by Agility, Pidgeot let himself fly ahead of the bird in the direction of Pewter City. This trainer was going down, literally.

Eventually, he saw a lake down below, just a little bit further ahead. Looking over his wings he let out a taunting chirp as he dropped down into the expanse below. He could hear the other bird behind him. It was time.

Pidgeot pulled all the electric energy in his body into one spot and released it with Gust, maybe this would be enough to teach that pesky trainer not to mess with Pidgeot. 

As he flew away he heard a splash as something fell into the water. The sound was like music to his ears. 

He looked back down to see how his  _ prey  _ was faring and was shown to the sight of a trainer who was being pulled onto the shore by a strange-looking slug. 

It was a good day to be Pidgeot.  


* * *

Sleeplessness was just part of being a nurse.

Claire learned that the day she had begun her new job. So could you really blame her if she had turned to coffee for energy? No, of course not. 

On Claire's first night shift of the week, she had already been awake the entire day, reading and rereading the patient profiles. On a good night, she could snatch a few hours of shut-eye but often there were the new admissions to deal with: the interviews and the paperwork (less said of those the better). Other times a patient would scream all night and wake the entire ward. 

After more than twenty-four hours awake her body demanded sleep but once she opened the front door to her home there were breakfasts to be made, lunches too, and cleaning up after her roommate, which took up most of her time. 

By nine am she would be done with cleaning up the house then it was a matter of putting in laundry, making beds, and planning dinner. By ten am she was too tired to think and sank fully clothed into bed. Thirty minutes later a door slammed shut, her roommate, probably off to work. Twenty minutes later a man hollered on the street. Ten minutes later the phone rang, it was her roommate.   
  
“Hey Claire,” the excited sound of her roommate yelled over the phone and Claire felt a tad bit angry, she hated this.

“What is it this time?” she practically growled into the phone.

“I….might’ve forgotten my bag, you know the one with all the tools I use. So, if you could swing by the hospital and bring them I’d appreciate it. Thank you goodbye”, he said the last part really quickly before quickly hanging up.

“Arghhhhh”, she yelled, not caring what her neighbors might think as she got up from her bed before heading to where she knew the supplies were. This was starting to be a daily occurrence and she  _ hated  _ it.

Her idiotic roommate couldn’t do anything by himself. He always needed her to bail his sorry ass out and she was getting _fucking_ tired of always doing this. When she found him, she was gonna beat the ever-living crap out of him. Why couldn’t he just let her sleep for once?

She felt regret over ever befriending him. That jerk.

She quickly got ready before grabbing the supplies and heading out. She stopped at a nearby cafe for a cup of coffee to re-energize herself before she bought a ticket for the Mareep Express. While the name itself sounded kind of odd, the entire enterprise was started by a mareep farmer who bought buses and rewired them to be powered by Mareeps. The farmer had soon become famous and now owned an entire business empire. The story truly was inspiring. 

These thoughts swirled in her head as she sipped the heavenly drink known as coffee. If it weren’t for this drink she’d have died of exhaustion. When she saw the bus arrive she was forced to gulp it down in its entirety and run towards the bus. Usually, it took the bus a while to arrive, why was the whole world against her today. It wasn’t fair.

Her entire trip was spent fighting off the feelings of sleepiness. Eventually, she gave in, but not before releasing her trusty Floette to guard her. 

It was thirty minutes later that she had woken up to the sounds of her floette frantically yelling at her. Where was she agai- Ah the hospital! She quickly got off the bus near the Pewter Hospital. The sun was barely up. Why did she  _ have to _ get up at this time?

“Floe ette,” her pokemon trilled as she comforted her. This was nice. 

“Thanks, Floette, we can talk more later. Jacob forgot his supplies. Again,” Floette nodded with a sympathetic smile before she was enveloped in red light and was sucked back into a tiny pink heal ball.

As she walked towards the hospital, she was taken in awe of the camaraderie she saw, people fed the wild pidgeys or spearows that came to them for food, while trainers themselves were openly playing with their partners. Such a sight was seldom seen in other cities. Another factor unique to Pewter was its low usage of pokemon centres. This was because people here believed that healing pokemon naturally was better for the pokemon themselves in the long run. 

Eventually, she reached the hospital and she felt her tiredness drain away as looked upon the building. The Pewter City Hospital, a facility that was recently implemented into Pewter. Before the hospital had been implemented people were forced to go to the Pokemon Centres. This caused a problem for pokemon as the queue was doubled slowing down the procedures and tiring the Nurses. This was why everyone was glad when this particular service was implemented here. Especially her.

She entered the hospital premises and made her way to the Paediatrician department, where her roommate, Jacob, worked. She clenched her fist in anticipation of the moment it would meet his face.   
  
She found his office and opened the door. She found him in the office, doing some paperwork. He looked up when the door opened and saw her.

“Ah, here you are. Thanks for bringing them to me, Claire” Jacob said with a grateful smile. One she wanted to wipe off his face.

She clenched her fists, ready to release her frustration in one punch when the door opened and a young girl walked in with her mother. They were obviously patients.

“I’ll see you later then”, she said through clenched teeth with a look in her eyes that promised him incredible pain. When she turned around however she did a complete 180 and smiled at the young girl, who tentatively smiled back at her.

She walked out, ready to head back home and finally  _ sleep, _ before she heard someone call her name. She turned around and spotted Mr.Prachoisci, her boss. He seemed to be frantically searching for someone.

“Claire!! Back so soon? Anyway, can you head to my office for a second? I need to talk to you about something,” he asked before walking towards the office, and Claire followed him.

He stopped in front of a door that read his name on a gold plate and opened it, before entering the oaken door. Claire entered silently after him, closing the door once she entered.

He made a show of walking over to his large ostentatious chair and sat down on it, “Claire this may be asking too much of but,” he stopped talking to take a folder out of his shelves, “a new trainer was admitted to the hospital yesterday. He ran into members of Team Rocket and was admitted here. Another trainer was found dead on the scene, killed by Team Rocket. Both of them were injured by the same thing, an electrode explosion.”

She processed the words. That was sad but she didn’t know how it affected her. Her boss, however, proceeded to drop a bombshell on her.

“As per Paragraph 50 of the Trainers Code, we are obliged to send a trainee nurse alongside him to observe his attitude and training methods and you were the best choice available.”

Claire reeled in shock. She would have to leave this peaceful place, her comfort, everything just for some snot-nosed brat?   
  
“Why me? Why can’t anyone else go?”, she said, angry at everything. She just wanted to rest a little and now this happened. Fuck this.

“Ah. A very good question Claire. See this boy has traces of a psychic type messing with his head.” he looked directly across at her and she felt something in her chest clench in fear, “in other words, your specialty.” 

“Wait what?!” her scream echoed throughout the room, this was followed by a sharp look from her boss.

“No one can know about this Claire.”

“Okay, sir.”

“You set out tomorrow along with the boy, go pack whatever you need for the trip,” he said as he extended his hand, offering the file to her, “look through it.” 

Claire silently left the room, the same way she entered the room, but now her head was filled with thoughts. All of which were sliced by the sight of a large Pidgeot that waddled into a room. The room of her patient.

What the hell had she gotten herself into.  


* * *

Ash opened his eyes, he had seen something… something purple. It was in his dreams, and it was swirling around in his mind. 

_ ‘It must have been a dream,’  _ he assured himself, feeling slightly better.

He yawned as he wiped his bleary eyes before turning around, spotting something. He frowned, before rubbing his eyes and focusing on it.

Ash would’ve liked to say that he had calmly got up and backed away when he saw Pidgeot, but the reality was much different. He screamed like a six-year-old before jumping from the bed and throwing his pillow at Pidgeot, which the large pokemon easily tossed back at him as though it were a sealeo.

He quickly reached for his Pokeballs only to find there was none, only to realize that his pokemon had been taken away for treatment, in other words, he was well and truly alone with the  _ bird _ . He slowly tried to creep away, keeping his eyes on the Pidgeot, who looked utterly content to stay where it was.

Someone opened the door behind him but he did not care. All he cared about was getting away from the avian, as it looked at him with its small  _ beady  _ eyes. ‘ _ Why is a pidgeot here? How did it get here?’ _ he thought to himself. 

“What is going on here?”, a sleepy voice made itself known from its spot behind Pidgeot.

Ash craned his neck to look past the pidgeot and at the speaker. She was only four or five years older than Ash, wearing a casual sweater and jeans along with a scowl on her small rounded face. Ash blinked. There was a Pidgeot right in front of them and she was doing nothing. A pokemon, which could tear them both apart in seconds, a murderous beast and she was just standing there doing absolutely nothing about it.

“Why were you screaming? This is a hospital, not your death bed,” she said, as she looked at his bed enviously. 

“There’s a pidgeot here. A  _ fucking pidgeot. _ Do something about it before it tears us both apart.” He demanded, before squeaking as the pidgeot headed closer.

She giggled a bit at his antics before quickly masking it with a stoic face, “It won’t kill you. If it wanted to kill you you would’ve been dead already. That pidgeot could have killed you in millions of ways before you opened your eyes and gotten away with it without anyone even seeing it, because pidgeots are  _ that _ fast,” by the time she had finished the sentence Ash had a pale white face, seeing that she quickly changed track,“ Besides, there is something tied to its feet”.

Ash turned towards the avian, that was when it struck him, “Pidgeotto?” he questioned.

“It isn’t a pidgeotto dumb-” the woman was interrupted by the avian bobbing its head.

“He’s my mom’s Pidgeotto, or he used to be since he seems to have evolved,” the other person gave a small understanding nod.

“Mind if I take a ride on Pidgeot back to my place?” 

“Do you have a license?” at her nod he continued with “then ask Pidgeot.”

Pidgeot stared at her for a moment before crouching down a bit, allowing her to climb on his back before taking off. Ash watched them go before he realized that he didn’t take the note from Pidgeot.

“Wait wait, ah dammit”, he yelled after them, realizing it was now futile to call them back since they won’t even hear him at this distance. Sighing, he sat on his bed before an idea struck him, he could get his pokemon back from the Pokemon Centre. It would be super easy, besides there aren’t weren’t any nurses around that he could ask for help.

Now if he could just remove this thingamajig, it was really starting to bother him. 

Eventually, he had done it, it only required a few broken wires, he would pay for it later, right now freedom mattered more.

Slowly he got up from his bed and tiptoed his way out of his room, that was when he realized he was wearing hospital garments,  _ ‘This, this is fine.’ _

As he walked down the hallway, he heard someone call out to him. He turned around and saw a guy probably in his early 30’s who was dressed in a similar fashion to him, it seemed like everyone here liked to wear hospital garments, everyone except that girl. 

“Hey bro, come over here,” the man waved him over as though he were a giant ship and Ash naturally walked over to him. The guy had an orangish complexion with hollow cheeks. Every one of his instincts told Ash to get away from here, away from that man, but he still walked towards the guy. 

“Hello, are you a doctor?” Ash asked and the answer he received was a punch to the face and a kick to his stomach, “don’t you dare look at me like that kid. I am Don Pear, master of the known criminal underworld, the great leader of the Mafia. I have a team stronger than Lance’s, and I own every known species of Pokemon.”

The punch helped Ash connect two little facts, he was a living magnet for crazy people. Period.

“Okay”, he said slowly rubbing his stomach. Damn that man could hit hard. “What are you doing here then?” he asked.

“They...they saw my power. They saw I was a threat. I would defy them, so they put me here, to cage me, restrict me, so I couldn’t do anything to them.” he ranted like a madman.

“What power?” Ash queried. The guy was raving mad but he was still curious.

“This hospital is a prison” continued the man, ignoring Ash completely, “They put whoever defies them into this place, this  _ hellhole, _ to suffer horribly,” he ranted ignoring Ash completely. Ash frowned at that. This hospital was nice enough, or at least to him it was, so that begged the question, how in the world was it oppressive?

“You may not believe me, but it's true. They test all kinds of things on us, new medicines, potions, we’re their test subjects. They keep us locked up inside our rooms all day and night and only bring us out for the  _ testing _ ”, he said, dramatically whispering the last part. Ash’s eyes widened and he took a step back in fear. 

“Really?”, Ash asked and the man nodded and replied “Yes, help us escape from this tyranny. Free us, and we will help you. We need your help and you see, only you can provide it.” He said whispering the last part as he pulled Ash close to him.

“Take this,” he slipped a pokeball into Ash’s hands, “use it well kid.”

“Where are you going?”

“I am going to free the others.” Ash simply nodded believing him to an extent and ran towards the general direction of Ward 16.

“Kids these days are too easy to fool”, he muttered under his breath as he giggled lightly and spread his arms, “let the games begin!”

Ash looked at the pokeball in his hands, while he believed the man to an extent something in him told him not to do it, but this lasted until he had opened the door to Ward 16, and all of a sudden all his hesitation left him. It. Was. Horrifying.

First came the smell, an odor that was so putrid that Ash was forced to cover his nose with his hand. The sight that followed it however was even more horrific. Countless people were simply lying there, injured and close to death, but they simply stared off into the distance as if that did not matter to them.

“Everyone! Come on!” Ash yelled, but they simply stared at him, as though his words were the wind, the meaningless kind that passed in front of you. Some of them furrowed their brows as if to indicate that thoughts were indeed forming in their mind, but soon their faces would relax back into tranquility. If it weren’t for the open eyes, Ash would have thought that they were sleeping… or worse dead. That was when he noticed it, their breathing, it was synchronised. A jolt of terror shot through him as he realised what was going on, he was in the psychic ward.

“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” a voice that sounded uptight yet somehow royal made itself known to him, the voice startled Ash and he whirled around to stare at the other person. It was a man who looked to be around his age maybe a tad bit older, around 18 or 19. He too was wearing the hospital garb, but his eyes… they freaked Ash out. They were orbs that were red to the point of looking as though the other man’s very eyes were bleeding.

As though he hadn’t seen Ash the red-eyed man continued “It seems a rattata has fallen into our masterful trap,” 

“W-w-who are you?” Ash asked as he glared at the other person.

“We are Ronald and we would like you to give us that,” he said as he pointed at the pokeball in his hands. 

“Er...?” Ash smartly said.

“That is our pokemon. We had it first, so return it. We know not how it landed in your hands but, we shall forgive you if you give it back,” he said as he stared at Ash as though he believed what he said was true with his very being. 

“How about we let the pokemon decide?” Ash wagered as he pressed the button on the pokeball, suffice it to say he did not like what followed that.  


* * *

  
When Claire had returned she expected to see, well she did not know what she expected to see but it wasn’t Ash geared up and standing in front of the hospital with a lunatone next to him. The records had no mention of a lunatone so how in the world did such an occurrence come to pass.

“Hey! Over here!” the boy yelled boisterously, followed by the moon rock who began to murmur in her head using random noises, as though it were a radio station, and she was a radio, a radio that had its antenna broken.

The most surprising part was the Pidgeot, he ran straight at the boy and offered his legs to him, ah right, the message. 

The boy grabbed it before heading away from the avian. Claire frowned. Why would the boy have a fear of the Pidgey line if he grew up alongside one?

Ash stood in place, reading. He then grabbed a pencil from his pocket and scribbled on the back end of the paper before tying it to the Pidgeot’s leg, though he did it with great care. Pidgeot then flew away, and Claire watched it fly until it became nothing more than a speck in the sky.

“So, I didn’t catch your name earlier”, She looked at Ash, who was smiling, probably since the Pidgeot was gone. 

“Claire”, she replied. “You must be heading to the Pewter City gym then”, she stated as though it were a fact. 

“Yeah, I still have to get my first badge,” Ash replied a tad bit sheepishly.

“So how did you get Lunatone?” She questioned him. “You didn’t have one according to the information I received.” 

“A long story” he replied and then as though the thought just passed through his mind he asked not a moment later, “What records?”

“Another long story,” she quipped, and Ash merely grunted back in response.

“Well, now time to head to the Pewter city gym then.” 

“Wait, you are coming with me?”

Thus they both set off swathed in the orange light of the sun with Ash’s yells serving as a tone that set the rest of their adventure.

“Wait a minute, I forgot to pick up my pokemon!” Ash yelled and ran towards the Pokemon Centre. 

Clair followed him sighing exasparatedly, the boy may not look like it but he can  _ run _ , “Wait up!” 

They were so caught up in their ‘race’ to the Pokemon Centre that neither of them noticed the glowing red eyes of the lunatone, nor did they know that just moments prior something had happened, something that will have far-reaching consequences.


End file.
